It takes Mother Nature millions of years, but an hour is all Eric Apfelbach needs.
Apfelbach is president and chief executive officer of Virent Energy Systems, a Madison-based company founded in 2002 by UW-Madison scientists Randy Cortright and Jim Dumesic.
Building upon technology invented and patented at the university, Virent uses solid-state catalysts to trump Mother Nature in the conversion of plant sugars into “biogasoline” and other hydrocarbon biofuels.