Can fungi influence the weather? Turns out, they just might. An international group of researchers that includes Virginia Tech’s Xiaofeng Wang and Boris A. Vinatzer discovered the identity of fungal proteins that can catalyze ice formation at high subzero temperatures. The research is published in Science Advances. One potential application of this discovery could be to engineer weather.
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What the fuck. Ice Nucleation Proteins are not new, they have been in commercial use for decades from animal and plant sources.
How fungal proteins could seed clouds
In a process called cloud seeding, particles that can trigger the water in the clouds to turn into ice crystals, called ice nucleators, are released into clouds. The ice crystals then grow in size as more and more water molecules stick to them. In a kind of snowball effect, the ice crystals grow and become heavier, fall toward the ground, melt as they pass through the atmosphere and become rain.
The traditional particle used for ice nucleating is silver iodide, which is highly toxic. The researchers believe the fungal protein molecule could provide a better alternative.
“If we learn how to cheaply produce enough of this fungal protein, then we could put that into clouds and make cloud seeding much safer,” said Vinatzer, professor in the School of Plant and Environmental Sciences.
Excuse me, the traditional method is hihgly what?
