The tiny organisms cling to oil droplets and perform a great feat: As a single organism, they may produce methane from oil by a process called alkane disproportionation. Previously this was only known ...

Natural gas—one of the planet's most abundant energy sources—is primarily composed of methane, ethane, and propane. While it is widely burned for energy, producing greenhouse gas emissions, scientists ...

Researchers often observe ethylene gas in oxygen-poor environments such as certain types of soil. For decades, scientists have known that ethylene comes from microbes. But the only known natural ...

Epifluorescence microscopy picture of Methanoliparia cells attached to a droplet of oil. The white scale bar represents a length of 10 micrometers. (Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology) (CN) ...