Microbes and fungi have long been nature’s helpers in producing high-quality food, drinks and medicines, but new digital technologies could unlock far greater potential for the European biotech industry.

From Anthony Koenig

Beer may not be the answer to all of life’s problems, but the science behind it could help decarbonize industrial processes and clean up the environment.

Biotechnology, which uses living organisms to produce different products or processes, remains important in today’s food and drink production, but it is also increasingly used in a wide range of industrial products, including medicines, combining ancient principles with cutting-edge technology.

Old knowledge, modern processes

“We have been using biotechnology to make cheese, beer and wine for thousands of years,” says Michael O’Donohue, an expert in microbial enzymes and industrial biotechnology at the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment (INRAE).

Now O’Donohue, who leads the EU-funded Bioindustry 4.0 project, is working with a team of biotech experts from ten European countries to explore how the same biotechnology principles can be used to produce chemicals or dispose of industrial waste with far less impact on the environment than conventional methods.

“We do not work with processes that take place in aggressive environments, such as those in the chemical industry,” said O’Donohue, highlighting a key positive aspect of biotechnology.

Small workhorses

Biotechnology has already changed our lives, and it has done so in ways that go far beyond improving the taste of beer. Modern advances began with the use of fungi in the early 20th century to produce life-saving antibiotics. Today, biotechnology remains critical to the production of medicines..

As O’Donohue explained, “the workhorses of biotechnology at the industrial level are mainly yeasts and filamentous fungi.”

However, since it is unpredictable which compounds and quantities yeasts will produce, the “Bioindustry 4.0” project, which runs until December 2026, will use digital technologies to improve the consistency of biotechnological results.

One advantage of biotechnology is that it can provide a cleaner alternative to traditional chemical manufacturing.

While many industrial processes require high temperatures and hazardous chemicals, in biotechnology most cells live between 30 °C and 40 °C, enjoy mild pH conditions, thrive in water-based fluids and do not produce hazardous or toxic substances.

The concept has already proven itself. Companies in Europe are using natural processes to produce color pigments and replacing chemical dyes, which can help reduce the textile industry’s enormous water consumption.

In addition, biotech companies can produce fuels and useful chemicals from agricultural waste or even exhaust gases from industrial plants.

Limit inconsistencies

However, the use cases are limited because yeast, fungi and bacteria can exhibit unexpected behavior, unlike synthetic chemicals. This is not sufficient for large parts of modern industry where consistency is paramount.

“We are talking about industrial processes here, and so it is always about cost, efficiency and reproducibility,” said O’Donohue. “We want to get the same results in every bioprocess. This is the case in automobile manufacturing, for example.”

Bioindustry 4.0 aims to address this gap by using digital technology. “It’s a challenge to bring these two technologies together, but it’s also a huge opportunity for biotechnology to move forward faster,” O’Donohue said.

For example, some of the research partners are developing real-time sensors for bioreactors in which microbes are grown in suspended solutions. The sensors can track microbial growth and production of compounds and alert researchers when they need to intervene, for example by adding more sugar.

Catching up

Biotechnology is a major global industry, worth €720 billion in 2021, but Europe is currently lagging behind the US. The European Commission calls biotechnology “one of the most promising technology areas of this century” and has taken steps to promote it in Europe.

“The US is the big player. They grab 60 percent of the pie,” O’Donohue said. “We’ve identified several weaknesses in biotech in Europe. We have a fragmented landscape, which makes it quite difficult for biotech development to figure out what’s available where.”

Nevertheless, says O’Donohue, the potential is there. “Europe is the birthplace of modern biotechnology. We have extensive infrastructure. We have a lot of expertise.”

Bioindustry 4.0 builds on the work of PREP-IBISBA, another EU-funded project that ran until the end of 2023 and aimed to simplify the process of sharing research facilities for industrial biotechnology.

With IBISBA, the project team developed a research infrastructure concept that provides access to state-of-the-art facilities to test, for example, the exact composition of new materials produced by microbes.

By using IBISBA, researchers can be quickly guided to the right expertise or equipment.

Building the market

The concept is already being put into practice and is helping young European companies like Calidris Bio, a Belgian start-up that aims to produce high-quality proteins using fewer resources.

“We want to launch it as an ingredient to replace fish meal and soy, which are currently not grown sustainably,” said Lieve Hoflack, co-founder of Calidris Bio.

But producing the protein is only half the battle. A new product must be tested for safety, taste and nutritional value.

“With IBISBA, we have found a place with the right equipment, the right expertise and also the right attitude to take our process to the next level,” said Hoflack.

The European Commission has said it wants to promote biotechnology to combat climate change and resource scarcity. It is working on an EU biotechnology law and wants to promote regulatory sandboxes in which novel approaches can be tested in a controlled environment for a limited period of time under regulatory oversight.

In addition, work is being done to harmonise regulation and establish an EU biotech hub to help companies navigate the regulatory landscape and provide targeted support to scale their businesses.

“We need to help European science stay in the race and help our innovators find support, especially in their first steps,” said O’Donohue.

Research for this article was funded by the EU Horizon programme. The views of the interviewees do not necessarily reflect those of the European Commission. This article originally appeared in horizon the EU magazine for research and innovation.