Pharmaceutical industry

Brand and product piracy is a worldwide problem. The economic damage is immense: in 2016, German companies alone recorded losses of around 53 billion euros, as a study by management consultants Ernst & Young (EY) shows. The use of such fraud in medicine is particularly problematic. The scandal surrounding inferior breast implants in 2010 showed what health consequences this could have. The French manufacturer Poly Implant Prothèse (PIP) had used cheap industrial silicone to reduce production costs.

Synthetic silk biopolymers developed by the German biotechology company AMSilk, headquartered near Munich, have found their way into many a industry application. Now, it will even become a part of future lightweight planes in an attempt to save fuels: Airbus and AMSilk have entered into a joint cooperation agreement to develop new composites for use in the aerospace industry.

Many plants need animals to eat their fruits in order to spread their seeds. To prevent the seeds from being destroyed during digestion, many of them form a slimy protective shell. This sheath also forms independently of digestion as soon as the seeds come into contact with water. A team of researchers from Kiel University has now discovered that the stability of the mucus membrane depends heavily on tiny fibres that bind the mucus to the seed.

Nearly nine years ago, in 2010, breast implants made of cheap industrial silicone caused a scandal in medical technology. The case occupied the courts for many years and also focused on the issue of biocompatibility for biomedical materials. These materials are used for therapeutic or diagnostic purposes in or on a patient's body. Therefore, high demands are placed on their safety - but standardized, comprehensive and rapid evaluation methods are still lacking.

The discovery of the revolutionary tool of molecular biology - the CRISPR-Cas9 gene scissors - was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry 2020. For the discoverers it is the crowning glory of a series of top-class science prizes: microbiologist Emmanuelle Charpentier, who conducts research in Berlin, and US molecular biologist Jennifer Doudna have long become stars of science.

Unexpected European deal in the industrial biotechnology sector: Jennewein Biotechnologie GmbH has a new owner. The Danish group Chr. Hansen took over the company from Rheinbreitbach on September 22. As bioökonomie.de found out on request from company founder Stefan Jennewein, the purchase price is 310 million euros.

Big news in stem cell research in farm animals: Together with colleagues from Great Britain and China, scientists from the Friedrich Löffler Institute (FLI) in Mariensee, Germany, have created a novel variant of pluripotent stem cells in pigs. Using a special nutrient medium, the researchers have obtained embryonic stem cell lines (ES) with "expanded potential" from pig embryos (Expanded Potential Stem Cells, EPSCs).

The history of surfactants began more than 4,500 years ago with the production of the first soap-like substance from olive oil and wood ash. Today, it is impossible to imagine everyday life without these active washing substances, which can be found in practically every detergent. As emulsifiers they have even found their way into food, because surface-active agents reduce the interfacial tension between two phases and make it possible to blend water and oil. Modern surfactants are also usually biodegradable.

DNA is not only the carrier of genetic information. For some biotechnologists, the molecule is also a material with fascinating properties - for example, for bioengineers working with DNA origami. Biomechanics at the TU Munich have now created a promising application for pharmaceutical development.