Access Utah

Utah is the only state in the U.S. to enact a law that requires someone who is engaged in bioprospecting to notify the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands before removing certain microorganisms, plants, or fungi from state lands. Bioprospecting is the search for and collection of biological material, usually microbes, that could prove either economically useful or in environmental protection efforts. For example if extreme algae in the Great Salt Lake can make a biofuel without impacting the ecosystem it can be harnessed in the laboratory. Since research may turn those algae into a profitable fuel, the law leaves the groundwork for Utah to benefit from profits made off the research.