Ohio State University researchers find electric jolt speeds up food waste processing

In Ohio, adding an electrical jolt to fermentation of industrial food waste speeds up the process and increases the yield of platform chemicals that are valuable components in a wide range of products, new research shows. In developing the new system, researchers at The Ohio State University also discovered that combining two bacterial species in the electro-fermentation mix not only helped accelerate the process, but allowed for more targeted chemical production. 

In this study, the food waste consisted of ice cream and sour cream – but the team has expanded the work with experiments using coffee grounds and lake algae. 

Eventual adoption of the technology could reap many benefits: efficient, sustainable and cost-effective production of multipurpose chemicals using source materials that would otherwise end up incinerated or in a landfill, contributing to greenhouse gas emissions.