News Items - International Association of Packaging Research Institutes
| ZHAW, Switzerland, explores biomaterials At Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW) in Switzerland, different research groups are in the final year of a four-year interdisciplinary project to develop bio-based alternatives to fossil-based plastics. Teams from the Institute of Food and Beverage Innovation, the Institute of Chemistry and Biotechnology and the Institute of Natural Resource Sciences at ZHAW are all contributing to the BIOMAT (Integrated Bio-based Materials Value Chain) project, says Selcuk Yildirim, who is himself head of the Center for Food Processing and Packaging.  The project includes ‘green’ technologies, such as the cultivation of microalgae to produce starch or polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB) as biomaterials, optimizing processes with regard to efficiency and sustainability – for example, by using waste streams as feed material for the microalgae (WP1 on the diagram). “Another approach is to convert side streams from the agro-food industry, such as potato peel, whey, coffee grounds or insect exoskeletons into sustainable bioplastics,” Yildirim explains (WP2). “Such side streams from food processing do not compete with food, and are therefore valuable and sustainable resources for the production of biomaterials.” At the same time, processes are being developed (WP3) to convert the biomaterials which result from the project into valuable products with defined applications, such as packaging (WP4).  BIOMAT began in 2019 and will run to the end of 2022, with a final international conference planned for the end of this year.For more information, email: selcuk.yildirim@zhaw.ch Published: 02/28/22 |