MSU nets grant to study fuel from fungi

Missoulian.com
By CARLY FLANDRO
Bozeman Daily Chronicle missoulian.com Posted: Sunday, December 26, 2010 10:15 pm

BOZEMAN - Last December, Angie Tomsheck walked into her professor's office and told him she didn't want to go home for the holidays, she didn't want to take her exams - heck, she didn't even want to eat lunch.

"At last," Gary Strobel, her research professor, told her, "you know what it's like to discover."

Tomsheck, who at the time was a Montana State University junior studying microbiology, had just discovered a fungus that produced eucalyptol - a rare compound only previously known to be found in eucalyptus bark.

Eucalyptol has the potential to be a biodiesel, and with Tomsheck's discovery, would be much easier to produce, making it a stronger contender to become a gasoline alternative for the mass public.

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