5 ms·

So, Dupont has a production-scale microbial process for 1,3-propanediol. What is the market for malonic acid if Dupont can already go directly to 1,3-propanedio

by lvs 10y ago

So, Dupont has a production-scale microbial process for 1,3-propanediol. What is the market for malonic acid if Dupont can already go directly to 1,3-propanediol? http://www.dupont.com/products-and-services/fabrics-fibers-nonwovens/fibers/brands/dupont-sorona/articles/how-dupont-sorona-is-made.html http://www.dupont.com/products-and-services/fabrics-fibers-n...

philipkglass 10y ago
Malonic acid and its derivatives have their own demand as esters and neat acid apart from conversion to 1,3 propanediol. It's possible to catalytically oxidize 1,3 propanediol to malonic acid, so they are somewhat competing in the same space. The "clean" advantage of these fermentation processes is IMO greater than the "sustainable" part. You could use renewable energy to synthesize all the upstream precursors of traditionally-synthesized malonic acid (e.g. monochloroacetic acid, hydrogen cyanide) from air and seawater and it would be perfectly sustainable. But the intermediate products are hazardous to handle and there's a large waste stream of aqueous salt solutions and organic solvents. Eliminating hazardous intermediates and producing waste streams that can be handled by simple wastewater treatment makes it cheaper to build and operate facilities for these chemicals.
- lvs 10y ago
  Agreed. Just pointing out that they're going up against an established DuPont process.
entee 10y ago
Also that process has been around for at least 10 years: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14580573 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14580573 I met the guy (Charlie Nakamura) who developed the process. It took a hell of a long time to get everything working at useful efficiency, then a fair amount of development to get it working at scale. Also see others in this space: Amyris (older synthetic bio company) Zymergen (newer synthetic bio company that seems to be doing some of the same things Lygos wants to do)

by lvs 10y ago

philipkglass 10y ago

Malonic acid and its derivatives have their own demand as esters and neat acid apart from conversion to 1,3 propanediol. It's possible to catalytically oxidize 1,3 propanediol to malonic acid, so they are somewhat competing in the same space. The "clean" advantage of these fermentation processes is IMO greater than the "sustainable" part. You could use renewable energy to synthesize all the upstream precursors of traditionally-synthesized malonic acid (e.g. monochloroacetic acid, hydrogen cyanide) from air and seawater and it would be perfectly sustainable. But the intermediate products are hazardous to handle and there's a large waste stream of aqueous salt solutions and organic solvents. Eliminating hazardous intermediates and producing waste streams that can be handled by simple wastewater treatment makes it cheaper to build and operate facilities for these chemicals.

lvs 10y ago
Agreed. Just pointing out that they're going up against an established DuPont process.

entee 10y ago

Also that process has been around for at least 10 years: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14580573 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14580573 I met the guy (Charlie Nakamura) who developed the process. It took a hell of a long time to get everything working at useful efficiency, then a fair amount of development to get it working at scale. Also see others in this space: Amyris (older synthetic bio company) Zymergen (newer synthetic bio company that seems to be doing some of the same things Lygos wants to do)