Together with a team from the Department of Bioprocess Engineering at TU Berlin our colleague and doctoral student Thomas Schiewe is investigating alternatives to conventional polymers. For the development of fully biodegradable plastics, the researchers wanted to avoid foods, such as corn or sugar cane, and came across waste fats. These are found in agricultural waste streams, the catering industry, or in the processing of food residues. To monitor the bacterial polymerization process in real time, the researchers use photon density wave (PDW) spectroscopy developed by innoFSPEC Potsdam. This enables them to optimize the harvesting of the bioplastics and increase the product yield.

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© Ernst Kazcysnki