Market analyses show: Fossil plastics are slowly becoming less common. Even if products made from bioplastics are still a niche, experts expect significant growth in the coming years. But bioplastics are only sustainable if they are made from renewable raw and residual materials.
In September 2020, process engineer Anne Lamp founded the start-up Traceless Materials in Hamburg together with Johanna Baare. The idea: to turn agricultural residues into a biomaterial that can be biodegraded in a short time and is particularly suitable for packaging and disposable products.
The development and production of enzymes and bioprocesses are the strengths of the Leipzig-based biotech company c-LEcta. In 2018, a financing round laid the foundation for establishing large-scale production of enzymes. Last year, the Leipzig-based company cracked the €10 million revenue mark and announced a move to a yet-to-be-built biotechnology campus building.
For the meta-study, commissioned by WWF and carried out by the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), 2,592 studies were evaluated that were conducted between 1960 and 2019.
Whether dishwashing detergents, laundry producte or household cleaners: When it comes to dirt, manufacturers rely on surfactants. Until now, the majority of these surfactants have been produced synthetically. They are based on petroleum, are often not very skin-friendly and usually pollute the environment. But the trend is moving toward biosurfactants. These are produced by microorganisms from renewable raw materials and are biodegradable.
On February 1, 2022, the German Brain Biotech AG announced the acquisition of Breatec B.V. including the Comix activities. The Dutch distributor, formulator and blender of functional food ingredients is primarily intended to expand the Brain Group's enzyme portfolio and open up new market fields.
Casein and whey protein are essential for the characteristic taste and texture of cheese made from animal milk. Vegan cheese alternatives based on plant proteins have struggled to keep up in this regard. Berlin-based food tech start-up Formo has developed a biotechnological process that enables these milk proteins to be produced in the laboratory. Formo uses microorganisms to produce casein and whey protein. These have been converted so that yeasts produce the milk proteins.
Faster healing of damaged nerves and muscles - that's what researchers at the University of Bayreuth expect from specially spun fibers made from biotechnologically produced spider silk. Spider silk is non-toxic, well tolerated by the body and hardly colonized by microbes. At the same time, the material is tough, strong and biodegradable. For this reason, medicine is already testing it to create a support scaffold on which damaged nerve cells can regrow. So far, however, this process is still taking a very long time.
Furthermore, the researchers conclude that the use of genetically modified crops in Europe would significantly reduce emissions of harmful greenhouse gases. Agriculture is responsible for around 25% of global greenhouse gas emissions, much of which is due to animal husbandry and the use of fertilisers. However, more than a third of agricultural emissions are also caused by change in land use- especially when forests are cut down and natural areas are converted into arable land to meet the rising global demand for food and animal feed.
With its national bioeconomy strategy, the German government aims to support the shift from an economy based predominantly on fossil raw materials to a sustainable, biobased economy oriented toward natural material cycles. To leverage the potential of the bioeconomy, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) supports numerous research projects - including with international partners. This is where the Bioeconomy in the North (BiN) initiative, founded in 2017 with partners from Finland, Norway, Sweden, Canada and Germany, comes in.