The key to water security could be lurking in a New Mexico sewage farm

In Las Cruces, New Mexico, a pilot project is using heat-loving algae to clean wastewater and generate energy

The sulphurous springs of Yellowstone national park are scalding, tainted with heavy metals and acidic enough to eat through clothing. But their murky depths are also home to an algae that scientists claim could one day help provide cleaner, healthier water around the world.

"Galdieria sulphuraria is one of the most interesting microorganisms on the planet," says Peter Lammers, a professor in algal bioenergy at Arizona State University. "It grows in a witches brew, can degrade over 50 organic molecules and even photosynthesise like a plant." That makes it ideal, Lammers says, to use somewhere even more unpleasant than Yellowstone's volcanic springs: urban sewage farms.