'Uranium-eating' bacteria to clean-up radioactive sites

'Uranium-eating' bacteria to clean-up radioactive sites | COSMOS magazine:

'via Blog this'

Some bacteria have the capacity to stabilise uranium contaminated sites, and if they are used they could reduce the chances of these sites contaminating major waterways and ecosystems, U.S. scientists have said.

Of the millions of tonnes of bacteria living within the Earth's subsurface, some are able to transform the oxidative state of uranium, which defines how the element will interact with oxygen to form various molecules. They change it from the radioactive, toxic and water soluble uranium (VI) to the less soluble, stationary and therefore less harmful uranium (IV) as part of their normal growth.