Biotechnology

Innovation is crucial to fulfil the potential of industrial biotechnology for sustainable production of fuels, chemicals, materials, food and feed. Similarly, scientific and technological advances in environmental biotechnology are needed to enable novel approaches to water purification, and ‘waste-to-product’ processes thus contributing to a circular economy. Increased fundamental knowledge encompassing enzymes, microorganisms and processes are essential for progress in this field. The Department of Biotechnology covers this research area and, based on new insights, selects, designs and tests new biobased catalysts, micro-organisms, and processes.

The department encompasses five research sections:

News

07 April 2016

Two ERC Advanced Grants for TU Delft researchers

Two TU Delft researchers have been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant. Yuli Nazarov and Jack Pronk will both receive this European grant, which is only awarded to five-year projects conducted by internationally established research leaders. Higher-dimensional topological solids realized with multi-terminal superconducting junctions Prof. Yuli Nazarov of the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience (Applied Sciences) will receive an ERC Advanced Grant of €1.5 million for his research proposal on HITSUPERJU (Higher-dimensional topological solids realized with multi-terminal superconducting junctions). His project focuses on topological materials: materials that exhibit the properties of conductors and insulators simultaneously in certain states. Topological materials were only discovered relatively recently, and they have since become a hot topic in the world of solid-state physics. These exotic materials are fundamentally interesting and also hold promise for concrete applications (such as a quantum computer based on Majorana fermions). However, they are very difficult to prepare and control. Yet some properties of topological materials can be closely simulated using a multi-terminal superconducting junction. Nazarov will put together a team of theorists to investigate this and formulate concrete suggestions for experiments and applications. Eliminating Oxygen Requirements in Yeasts Prof. Jack Pronk of the Department of Biotechnology (Applied Sciences) will receive an ERC Advanced Grant of €2.5 million to conduct research on the oxygen requirements of yeasts and fungi. The project, entitled ELOXY (Eliminating Oxygen Requirements in Yeasts), aims to shed light on the as yet unanswered question of why many yeasts and fungi need molecular oxygen. Even when these micro- organisms can obtain plenty of energy from anaerobic fermentation processes, they still need small amounts of oxygen - and nobody knows why. This conundrum is not only of scientific interest, but is also relevant for large-scale application of yeasts and fungi in anaerobic industrial processes.