This is the sort of thing that made me decide to write a whole book about these bugs...
LS9 Inc., a company in San Carlos, Calif., is already using E. coli bacteria that have been reprogrammed with synthetic DNA to produce a fuel alternative from a diet of corn syrup and sugar cane. So efficient are the bugs' synthetic metabolisms that LS9 predicts it will be able to sell the fuel for just $1.25 a gallon.
Synthetic DNA on the Brink of Yielding New Life Forms - washingtonpost.com
