One limitation of producing biofuel is that the alcohol created by fermentation is toxic to the microbes that produce it. Now scientists are closer to overcoming this obstacle.

Researchers from the University of Cincinnati and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have achieved a breakthrough in understanding the vulnerability of microbes to the alcohols they produce during fermentation of plant biomass.

With the national lab’s neutron scattering and simulation equipment, the team analyzed fermentation of the biofuel butanol, an energy-packed alcohol that also can be used as a solvent or chemical feedstock.