Algae as living biocatalysts for a green industry
Thursday, July 2, 2020 - 11:50
in Earth & Climate
Many substances that we use every day only work in the right 3-D structure. Natural enzymes could produce these in an environmentally friendly way—if they didn't need a co-substrate that is expensive to produce to date. A research team at Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) has discovered exactly the necessary enzymes in unicellular green algae. Better still: living algae can be used as biocatalysts for certain substances, and they bring the co-substrate along, producing it in an environmentally friendly manner through photosynthesis. The team published its report in Algal Research on 17. June 2020.