Synthesis Biotechnology Brings about Advanced Manufacturing and New Reform of Chemicals
Year:2018 ISSUE:3&4
COLUMN:FINE & SPECIALTY
Click:352    DateTime:Feb.07,2018

Synthesis Biotechnology Brings about Advanced Manufacturing and New Reform of Chemicals

By Chen Fang, Chen Yunwei, Chengdu Library and Information Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences

Industrial biotechnology has made a milestone development in commercial growth and environmental improvement in the past decade. Constant advances have been made in the sustainable utilization of renewable biomasses, the commercial operation of new-type energy crops, the use of methane-oxidizing bacteria and algae to ferment methane into usable products and the commercial application of bio-catalysis and enzymes. Huge opportunities are therefore created for the development of industrial biotechnology in the 21st century.

The advanced manufacturing of chemicals meets the investment wind gap of synthesis biotechnology

   According to forecasts made by McKinsey, by 2020 bio-products will account for 11% of the global chemicals market volume (US$3 401 billion) and the sales volume of bio-products will reach US$375-441 billion with a CAGR of 8%. It is expected that by 2020 bio-fuels and plant extracts will still account for over a half of the sales volume of bio-products. Like bio-fuels, new bio-polymers, renewable chemicals, bio-medicines and bio-catalysts used in industrial processes will also have a rapid growth.
   The focus of risk investments in bio-industry has shifted from substitutes of matured chemicals to subversive synthesis biology and conversion technologies in recent years. Constant breakthroughs made in new technologies has already pushed synthesis biology to the frontline of solving global problems related to health, medicine, material, energy, environment, climate change and population growth. It is expected that by 2025 the global market volume of synthesis biology will hopefully reach around US$26 billion. It will mainly include oligonucleotide synthesis, DNA synthesis, standard DNA element and synthetic gene, as well as their applications in agriculture, chemicals, bio-fuels and health-care products.

Synthesis biotechnology leads investment hot spots in bio-industry

   Synthesis biotechnology is giving birth to the third-generation biotechnology revolution after the traditional industrial fermentation technology and the large-scale gene operation technology and guiding the advanced manufacturing of chemicals to march in an efficient, smart, accurate and controllable direction. Following aspects are expected to become lasting investment hot spots in bio-industry.

   (1) Raw material

   Diversified biomass resources constitute the raw material base for the development of bio-industry. Ensuing the cost, stability and availability of raw materials is an important precondition for the development of bio-industry. For example, the corn destocking policy in China for next 3-5 years will bring favors to qualified fuel ethanol processing enterprises and downstream sugar and starch enterprises and promote the development of the corn intensive processing sector. Plants, microorganisms, aquatic resources and various scrap materials are also essential to the formation of a sustainable and productive value chain.
   Single-carbon raw materials have extensive applications. They have sound adaptability to bio-catalysts and bio-conversion processes. Major single-carbon raw materials include methane, methanol, formaldehyde, formic acid and CO2. Approaches for using methanol are basically identical to methane. Many microorganisms that can use methane can also use methanol. Microalgae and blue-green algae can also be used to convert CO2 into various products. An alternative scheme for the use of CO2 is the combined use with H2 and formic acid to convert CO2 into usable chemicals. The anaerobic fermentation of synthetic gas composed of CO2, H2 and CO is also proved to be an effective way for using single-carbon raw materials to produce fuels and chemicals. A great number of investment opportunities will appear in the conversion of synthetic gas into a series of potential fuels, bio-polymers, precursors, specialty plastics, nylon precursors, solvents and medicine precursors.

   (2) Technology

   Constant advances made in methods and technologies such as gene sequencing and synthesis and gene editing have forcefully driven the intensive development of industrial biotechnology in a direction of greater accuracy and smartness. The next-generation innovation to bio-industry will be the combination of artificial intelligence, bioengineering and internet.
   New tools and platform technologies have aroused the attention of investors in recent years. DNA synthesis has quickly developed into an investment hot spot. Integrated researches on technologies such as robot automation, machine study, novel software and high throughput screening with the rapid development and optimization of strains and the production of industrial chemicals and other bio-products as the goal will gain huge development opportunities in future. Examples include the intensive analysis of microbial genomes and metabolic pathways with big data treatment technologies and analysis platforms, the optimized design of high-effect enzyme preparations according to human will through computer-aided technologies, the conversion of microorganisms, plants and animal cells into bio-plants that can produce new-type fuels, chemicals and even bio-computers and the provision of cell engineering and analysis schemes based on CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technology by platform technologies.
   Researches on human microbial communities can help understand the role of microorganisms in health and diseases. Researches on plant and soil microbial communities can promote the upgrading of the crop health level. Composite microbial inoculants and bio-control products can be extensively used in corn, soybean, fruits and vegetables and help plants absorb nutrients and withstand pests, diseases and herbicides. With the great attention of academic and industrial circles to researches on microbial communities, the tapping of special genes of microbial communities, the upgrading of the health level of microbial communities and the development of composite microbial formulations will also have an investment upsurge in future.

   (3) Product

   Synthesis biology uses biomass raw materials and bio-processes to replace petrochemical processes to produce chemicals with low cost, small output and high value. Capacities of bio-chemicals and bio-materials as basic structural models of numerous terminal products (such as plastics, lubricants, waxes and cosmetics) will make a constant expansion in the world and the development prospect is promising. The innovation to synthesis biotechnology will also breed more subversive technologies and unnatural products such as spider silk protein and man-made animal protein and bring about unprecedented applications.
   Fine chemicals: Many pioneering enterprises in the line of bio-industry will concentrate their research focus on bio-chemicals with small output, high added value and no direct competition with oil-based products. These products usually have unique functions similar products in market do not have. Examples include functional nutritious health-care products, fine daily articles and personal care products targeted at high-end consumer groups and textiles and decorative materials with excellent performance. Modern industrial biotechnology has advantages of high effect, high selectivity, mild conversion conditions and environment friendliness and can complete some reactions traditional chemical methods can hardly do.
   Pharmaceutical chemicals: Pharmaceutical chemicals are without doubt bio-products with relatively high added value. The bio-synthesis of effective ingredients of natural medicines with APIs produced through chemical synthesis can effectively solve problems such as serious pollution and low synthesis efficiency in plant extraction or chemical synthesis routes for pharmaceutical chemicals. It is an inevitable choice that can renovate traditional pharmaceutical processes and chemical processes, greatly reduce the consumption of energies and water resources, minimize the emission of environmental pollutants, promote energy conservation and emission reduction and ensure the coordinated development of economy and environment. Natural medicines such as artemisinin, ginsenoside and rhodiola root and chemical medicines such as lincomycin and levodopa have achieved the partial or total replacement by biosynthesis routes. Such products will have more varieties in future and their capacities will also hopefully make a further increase.
   High-effect enzyme preparations: The important direction for the development of new products such as composite enzyme preparations and refined enzyme preparations with higher technical content and added value and the rapid expansion in the market of functional foods and textiles will push the market development of new enzyme preparations. In the food and beverage sector, with the constant increase in the market demand of products that can promote digestion and increase nutrition value, the consumption of enzyme preparations will have a prominent increase. In the cleaning and decontamination sector, the optimization of the strain production and the improvement of the low-temperature decontaminating ability will likely bring about a sustained growth of markets. In the animal feed sector, the addition of enzyme preparations can increase the nutrition of feed and promote its digestion by animals. Enzyme preparations are also safer than antibiotics in use. They will likely help enlarge the scale of the nonreactive breeding industry and make a drastic increase in future.

   (4) Process

   Green bio-processes based on enzyme engineering and bio-catalysis can play important roles in product quality improvement, energy conservation, emission reduction, production cost reduction and environmental protection. The implementation of the policy for shifting environmental protection fee to tax will bring greater cost pressure to papermaking, textile and leather sectors that have high pollution and high emission. Industries using biodegradation and bio-catalysis technical routes will therefore also have a golden development period.
   Remarkable research achievements in synthesis biotechnology, bio-chemicals, bio-materials, microbial environmental control, bio-sensors, green bio-processes and microorganism diversification have been made in China in recent years. The development of industrial biotechnology has also acquired a certain development pattern. Both the ability for independent innovation and the level of production technology are much higher. Pushed by multiple factors such as the promotion by industrial policies, the intensive readjustment to industrial sectors and the demand increase in daily life, bio-industry in China will have a bright development prospect. It is expected that by 2022 the output value of broad-sense bio-industry in China will hopefully reach RMB10 000 billion. The replacement rate of bio-materials and bio-chemicals (excluding bio-medicines) will make a gradual pickup and the proportion of their sales revenue in the total sales revenue of materials and chemicals will hopefully reach 10%.