Global Bioenergies announces break-through in direct biological production of butadiene
Global Bioenergies announced having succeeded in the production of bio-sourced butadiene by direct fermentation. It is the first time ever an entirely biological production process – i.e. without any chemical step - is reported for butadiene.
Butadiene is a key platform molecule of the petrochemical industry with a world-wide market of over 10 million metric tons per year. As of today, butadiene is exclusively obtained from fossil resources, principally through extraction from naphtha cracking. Given the decrease in naphtha cracking capacities, there is a need for alternative routes to butadiene. In this context Global Bioenergies has signed in 2011 a collaboration agreement with Synthos to develop a direct fermentation route allowing a cost-effective transformation of renewable resources into butadiene. Since such a direct biological route does not exist in nature, Global Bioenergies first had to invent a new metabolic pathway comprised of a series of non-natural enzymatic reactions. This step was successfully achieved in December 2012.
The next step consisted in improving the activity of those enzymes and implementing them into a bacterial strain.
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