On January 3, the
U.S. Department of Energy announced that it has awarded Lansing's
MBI International and
Novozymes up to $2.5 million to develop new enzyme-based technologies to convert corn stover into sugars for subsequent conversion into biofuels.
"This award marks a significant milestone in MBI’s efforts to develop and commercialize our novel AFEX™ technology," says Allen Julian, MBI Chief Business Officer. "The collaborative effort with Novozymes made possible by this award will enable us to progress the technology needed to make efficient, economical cellulosic sugars available to biofuels and biochemical companies that are looking for non-food competing sugar sources."
The award will be used to further fund research and development needed to optimize the enzymes needed to extract fermentable sugars from AFEX™ treated biomass. Creating enzymes that are specifically engineered to work with AFEX™ treated biomass will reduce the cost of cellulosic sugars.
Julian explains the relationship between Novozymes and MBI: "There are two key challenges in converting agricultural biomass into bio-based fuels, chemicals, and other products: finding an economical way to handle, store and haul low density biomass from the farms where it is produced to biorefineries where it can be converted into useful products; the second involves technologies to efficiently break the biomass down into fermentable sugars. MBI’s AFEX™ technology addresses these challenges by providing a very effective and economical means to convert raw biomass into a stable, dense, pellet that can be produced close to the source of the biomass and readily shipped, using existing infrastructure, to biorefineries. Novozymes brings world-class enzyme development capability to the collaboration, enabling the development of an enzyme system specifically engineered to work with AFEX™ treated biomass to extract the maximum possible sugars at the lowest possible cost."
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