From cells to solutions: How PHA could transform sustainability in the next five years
A groundbreaking discovery by a team of Chinese scientists, led by Chen Guoqiang, a bioengineering professor from Tsinghua University, is paving the way for a greener future.
They have developed a new biosynthetic material, PHA, which is grown entirely within cells. This innovative material stands out for its exceptional properties—non-toxic, harmless, and fully biodegradable—making it a promising alternative for addressing plastic pollution.
With the ability to achieve a negative carbon footprint, PHA has the potential to revolutionize industries ranging from food packaging to medical supplies, offering eco-friendly solutions that significantly reduce carbon emissions.
Although PHA remains costly today, Chen predicts that with technological advancements, it will enter people's daily lives within the next decade.
If you leave two seemingly identical boxes made traditional plastic and PHA in nature, a traditional plastic will take up to 500 years to fully disappear in nature and PHA only takes one to three years.
Why is that?
A new biological material grown by cells. PHA is non-toxic, harmless, fully biodegradable and can even achieve a negative carbon footprint of its entire life cycle, this eco-friendly material holds promise in eliminating plastic pollution at its source
We are going to plunge into the micro world to explore how tiny cells are creating a huge market.
Production of PHA is like brewing beer or making yogurt. It’s all about cell-based synthesis and even the equipment is similar. You can think of the production of PHA as like a milk processing line.
Step 1: Fermentation - It involves feeding nutrients to the cells, like feeding cows.
Step 2: Extraction - This involves extracting PHA from the nutrient solution, like milking a cow.
Step 3: Drying - the PHA is transformed from a liquid to a solid state, like turning milk into powdered milk.
Step 4: Packaging - the PHA product is packaged from manufacturers, like packaging powdered milk for further processing. This process takes place in a relatively open factory, which was also my first impression. Unlike traditional plants, there is no need for full protective gear, and you can even observe the production process up close. All of this is made possible by a special substance discovered by Professor Chen Guoqiang’s team – Halomonas.
Halomonas, one of the halophile bacteria, can resist contamination, because Hallomonas grows under alkali condition and higher osmotic pressure, introduced by sodium chloride. And this extreme condition prohibited other microorganisms. Finally, we find that Halomonas is perhaps one of the ideal microorganisms for industrial production, especially for scaling up. PHA is completely biosynthesis.
Halomonas serves as the factory for PHA production. Their discovery has lowered barriers, making industrial production of this green material possible.
PHA production is still costly, because of the conversion efficiency from substrate to PHA, but there are many other new technologies developed, including what we’re doing in the future, PHA is not just one material. PHA is a big family. It contains maybe 10 billion different structures. So, you can guess PHA will go into normal daily life in many families maybe in the next 5-10 years with its production cost reduced significantly.
Professor Chen’s team has produced over 30 types of PHA using Halononas, making China the world leader in PHA variety and the only country able to sell food grade PHA in China, the United States and the European Union.
For example, a straw to buried in the soil a year ago, and this is what it looked like originally. After one year, it’s already broken down into fragments, and if to leave it for another year, it will completely disappear into nature. PHA at its core, is a type of fat. You can think of it as a feast for microbes. They consume it just like we’d enjoy drumsticks. This means humans can use these products, which look like plastic but perform far better, without a burden on the environment. Take a T-shirt, for instance. You can feel how comfortable it is to the touch. Yes, it’s very soft. And it’s completely free of any components that might cause skin allergies, because it’s entirely bio-based, like the fat in your body. In fact, it protects your body. PHA can also be used as a material for medical implants. It has excellent biocompatibility. This is a magnified model of a PHA microsphere. For example, if I were a diabetes patient who needs daily insulin injections, I could instead use these drug-loaded microspheres. With just one injection per month, the microspheres would slowly release insulin, reducing the frequency of injections and alleviating the patient’s discomfort.
Currently, much of the US PHA market is focused on food and beverage applications. While PHA presents a vastly superior alternative in this sector, their mass adoption is delayed by higher production cost and limited governmental support, placing the responsibility on consumers to recognize the positive benefits of PHAs. We believe there are other untapped opportunities for PHAs in sectors that increase consumer awareness, such as the footwear industry, 3D printing, cosmetic trade, in addition to commercial fishing and agricultural applications where products frequently become in direct contact with our ecosystems.
PHA is a key example of biomanufacturing. Simply put, biomanufacturing uses modified cells as factories to produce materials that humans need.
China occupies at least 70 percent of the industrial fermentation capacities, more than the whole world combined. I guess, in the future, China, at least on the manufacturing side, will be more developed than all the other nations.
According to McKinsey by 2025, the economic value of synthetic biology and biomanufacturing is expected to hit $100 billion, with 60 percent of the world’s material production coming from biomanufacturing. Through scientists’ continuous exploration, these tiny cells are unleashing incredible potential. Represented by PHA, biomanufacturing nurtures a green and sustainable future while creating a thriving market that injects endless vitality into the global economy.
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