Carbonate minerals promise a secure form of CO2 storage, but geochemical models suggest their formation occurs on a geologic, not human, timescale. Yet many microbes alter the morphology of carbonate minerals and subsurface microbes are abundant, suggesting that biological systems may have additional, underexplored effects on rates of mineralization. To test this, we monitored the rate of calcium carbonate (CaCO3) mineralization under supersaturated conditions in the presence of a wide variety of microbes. Surprisingly, mineralization is accelerated in the presence of many species compared to abiotic controls, and this rate acceleration occurs with even metabolically inactive bacteria. Taken together, our data suggest that microbial surfaces bind Ca2+ and thus increase the rate of CaCO3 nucleation. These results stress the importance of microbes, even dead ones, on the rate of carbonate mineralization and indicate that microbes could be used to sequester CO2 as a mineral on an accelerated timescale.

Widespread acceleration of CaCO<sub>3</sub> mineralization by microbes: Impacts on geologic carbon sequestration

242nd National Meeting (2011)

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Widespread acceleration of CaCO3 mineralization by microbes: Impacts on geologic carbon sequestration

Widespread acceleration of CaCO₃ mineralization by microbes: Impacts on geologic carbon sequestration