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For all of my 40-some years in journalism, I have had a connection, of sorts, to lignin. It’s a component of newsprint such as you are holding in your hands as you read this. In fact it’s the component that causes newsprint to yellow in time. But that’s about all I know about lignin except that it’s part of the cell walls of plants and the term comes from the Latin word for wood.

By contrast, for nearly 40 years, John Ralph, a University of Wisconsin scientist, has had a much more intense interest in lignin. The structure of lignin has been his research subject since he was a young man. And that has made him a much-sought-after talent in the nation’s bid to substitute grasses and woody plants for food crops such as corn in the production of ethanol to reduce the nation’s dependence on oil for fuel.

Until earlier this year, Ralph was employed by the Dairy Forage Research Lab at UW-Madison. After being courted like a No. 1 NFL draft pick, he joined the team at UW’s Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC). He was also recruited by U.S. Department of Energy-funded centers located in Berkeley, Calif., and Oak Ridge, Tenn.

A UW news release explained why: “People with John’s training, experience and creativity just do not exist in this country or elsewhere in the world,” said Tim Donohue, GLBRC director and professor of bacteriology at UW-Madison. “It was critical to get John’s research team plugged into the Wisconsin bioenergy effort. One only need look at the number and type of offers he was getting at other places to see his unique talents in chemistry and plant biology. By keeping John as a member of the Madison bioenergy research community, the campus, state, region and Great Lakes Center are positioned to maintain leadership in the emerging field of cellulosic biofuels.”

The news release added: “UW-Madison is betting that Ralph’s intricate knowledge of plant cell walls will expose new ways of engineering plants that are easier to convert into ethanol. Although the technology already exists to do that, the process is energy-intensive and inefficient, which is why so-called ‘grassoline’ has yet to emerge as a viable alternative to petroleum-based fuels or ethanol made from corn kernels.”

Asked to comment, university representatives were unable immediately to obtain a cost of the total package that kept Ralph at UW. But the package included providing him and his team with a million-dollar nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy machine that he needs in his research. Also part of the package were academic staff positions for two researchers in addition to a substantial raise for him.

The UW public relations reporter who wrote the Ralph news release said it had received little attention by the media. That would explain why I haven’t seen anything about it other than the news release that I saved when it came out nearly a month ago.

That strikes me as unfortunate since so much is at stake in our willingness as state taxpayers to support such ventures. We need to understand that there is a substantial cost in long-term research if we are to enjoy what could be an enormous payback if the bioenergy industry flourishes in Wisconsin.

The decision to retain Ralph’s work for Wisconsin may very well mean that before the newsprint you hold yellows with age, you might be using cheap biofuel made possible by a man’s persistent pursuit of lignin’s cellular secrets. And you helped make it happen.