news

We are proud to present our recent review about oligosaccharide production and its downstream processing. Oligosaccharides are an important ingredient for not only food and feed but also cosmetic products. The biocatalytic production processes offer a variety of advantages compared to chemical synthesis, such as an improved sustainability, environmental-friendliness and a lower energy effort. However, a successful production process requires an efficient downstream processing in terms of yield and costs. The review gives a good overview about actual unit operations and their corresponding separation principles. Our authors shed a light on membrane technologies (eg nanofiltration), chromatographic methods or solvent extractions, for example. Furthermore, they discuss the combination of different approaches. Access the full article from the Journal “Biotechnology Advances” here: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biotechadv.2020.107568

The paper “Three-enzyme phosphorylase cascade immobilized on solid support for biocatalytic synthesis of cello-oligosaccharides” was published in the journal ChemCatChem in December 2019. Now, all data are open access as well!

What is it about?

The synthesis of cello-oligosaccharides is a multistep process, which consists of several enzymatic reactions. For the sake of efficiency, biotechnologists would prefer to string these steps together (enzyme cascades), but this is challenging. Enzymes need to be recycled in order to keep their functionality. The recycling process is easier when enzymes are immobilized, but this process is well developed only for single enzymes so far. The actual CARBAFIN paper presents a controlled co-immobilization of three enzymes (glycoside phosphorylases) for the conversion of sucrose and glucose into soluble cello-oligosaccharide chains. The system is highly active AND recylable!

This is a very important step forward, since multienzyme cascades play an important role in synthetic carbohydrate chemistry.

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Picture credits: Pixabay (Symbol for immobilized enzymatic cascades)

Glucosylglycerol (GG) is one of the main CARBAFIN targets that is an attractive compound for commercial applications in the cosmetics as well as the food industry. The enzymatic GG-production comes along with a high excess of glycerol, when using the enzyme sucrose phosphorylase. For the final product, glycerol needs to be removed and our CARBAFIN team found a good solution: nanofiltration. The researchers screened membranes at different varied pressure and temperature. The most suitable separation was achieved with a specific polyamide membrane and after 6 filtration cycles glycerol could be completely removed.

Find out more about the details!

The article was published in Separation and Purification Technology, Vol. 241 (2020).

AVA Biochem had an interesting press release on 31st January 2020 about their cooperation with Michelin group:

[AVA Biochem has developed, patented and piloted a fully water-based
process for the conversion of industrial sugars into the 100% bio-based molecule 5-HMF. This platform chemical is ideally positioned to replace petroleum-sourced chemicals in various mass-market applications, due to its versatility, non-toxicity and bio-sourcing. Applications include biopolymers (such as yarns, films, bottles and other packaging) as well as resins and adhesives, where 5-HMF replaces highly toxic formaldehyde. With the common goal to further implement 5-HMF in various materials and chemical applications, AVA Biochem has entered into a Joint Development Agreement with the Michelin Group.

This collaboration aims to establish the world’s first commercial-scale production plant of 5-HMF, and to ultimately bring novel product applications onto the market based on this versatile chemical. These applications are all targeted to improve the performance, economics, sustainability (low carbon footprint) and safety (non-toxicity) of a variety of both consumer goods and industrial
products.

“We are proud to be working together with one of the most innovative players in their industry. The collaboration with Michelin represents a powerful opportunity to develop eco-friendly industrial products. It is an important step forward in AVA Biochem’s ambition to become a preferred partner and key provider of sustainable chemicals solutions and worldwide licenses to industrial and consumer goods groups”, says Peter Achermann, Chairman & Co-Founder of AVA Biochem.

Christophe Rahier (Michelin Senior vice president, Strategy and new businesses High Tech Materials) says: “This collaboration demonstrates the ability of AVA Biochem to master their new process. We will contribute to its know-how in the industrialization and evaluation of the performance of these products in different applications. This collaboration also illustrates Michelin’s growing interest in “green chemistry”, in line with our sustainable development strategy
and our vision of tomorrow’s mobility.”]

In CARBAFIN, AVA Biochem is currently testing the chemical-technical feasibility of using the fructose streams from cellodextrin or glucosylglycerol synthesis for the 5-HMF production. Therefore, they have installed a CARBAFIN mini reaction plant. We are curious about the results, stay tuned!

From 18th to 20th November the CARBAFIN took the great opportunity to exhibit its concept at the H2020 corner of the European Summit of Industrial Biotechnology (esib 2019, www.esib.at). About 500 attendees from all over the world discussed about “bioproduction in the sense of bioeconomy” and took the chance for chat with our project staff at the exhibition table. Additionally, CARBAFIN presented its technologies and ideas in the frame of a science flash.

One day after the event, the consortium directly went into its 4th project progress meeting and welcomed the external advisory board for an inspiring stakeholder workshop.

CARBAFIN has released its first newsletter! Let’s take a step backwards in time and look what happened so far. If you don’t want to miss the next edition, feel free to subscribe to our newsletter and get infos as one of the first.

CARBAFIN Newsletter No 1

Our team member Chao Zhong presented his results at the EUROCARB XX, taking place in Leiden, Netherlands from 30th June to 4th July 2019.

He showed his process of a controlled polymerization of cellodextrins from glucose by using coupled cellobiose and cellodextrin phosphorylase. The resulting soluble cellodextrins have interesting applications as ingredients for human and animal nutrition. The study provides the basis for an efficient and product DP-(degree of polymerization)-controlled biocatalytic synthesis of cellodextrins from expedient substrates.

You are interested in the full presentation? Please contact us.

18 months are over and the first CARBAFIN review meeting took place in Ghent, Belgium. A lot of work has been done, and there is still a lot to do! The first CARBAFIN publication was published recently and is about the enzymatic production of cellodextrins with the help of a novel cellobiose phosphorylase from Clostridium cellulosi.

Get the full article here.

You are interested in corresponding data? Please follow the link to Zenodo database.