Category: Top Stories

Fungus fashion, BMW i Hydrogen NEXT unveiled, spider silk and cellulose composite, Nestlé opens packaging research center, and more: The Digest’s Top 10 Innovations for the week of September 25th

September 24, 2019 | Jim Lane

With Climate Week on many minds this week, it’s good to see innovations being developed to take a step in a better direction. Take CPI Card Group which is launching credit cards made from waste plastic recovered from the ocean. Or researchers who have created a strong composite bioplastic from wood cellulose fibers and silk […]

The NEXT 50 Companies to Disrupt the World

September 23, 2019 | Jim Lane

In Florida, The Digest recognized the NEXT 50, “the 50 Next Companies to Disrupt the World”, bioeconomy companies that are on the journey to commercial scale with an emerging technology. The advanced bioeconomy has diversified significantly and the NEXT 50 includes companies focused on fuels, chemicals, foods, new crops and crop protection, animal feeds, and […]

Selling Cells – Ginkgo Bioworks Raises $290M, Latest financing brings total to $719M for cell programming

September 22, 2019 | admin

Synthetic biology. It sounds like something from a sci-fi movie, or an oxymoron like jumbo shrimp or clearly confused. After all, biology is the study of living organisms. And synthetic means made by chemical synthesis, especially to imitate a natural product. But synthetic biology has real potential to replace costly or unsustainable manufacturing processes and […]

The Algae Summit, groups to know, slides to see, and the Megatrends

September 19, 2019 | Jim Lane

The 2019 Algae Summit has come and gone, the delegates are winding their way back from Orlando, and we’ve seen that algae companies continue to be as resilient and adaptive as the organisms they work with. The 15 MEGATRENDS In the final plenary session, the Digest joined the stage for a session on MEGATRENDS, and […]

The Competitive Edge: Vertec BioSolvents, Inc.

September 19, 2019 | Jim Lane

Q: What was the reason for founding your organization – what was the open niche you saw that could be addressed with a new product or service? What was the problem, or gap, or opportunity? Certain petroleum solvents present regulatory and HS&E restrictions for manufacturers using solvents in formulations or cleaning applications. Vertec BioSolvents, Inc. […]

Heard on the Floor at the Algae Biomass Summit

September 18, 2019 | Jim Lane

We know this about algae. They’re small, they die off quickly in great numbers, and every time you look around there’s more of them coming, there’s more diversity every day, but the pace of algae birth (think minutes) exceeds the pace of algae evolution (think millennia). Pretty much sums up the algae industry these days. […]

A juicer that turns peels into bioplastic cups, shellfish plastic, White Dog Labs’ feed supplement, eucalyptus fiber and wool sneakers, plant starch dog toys, and more: The Digest’s Top 10 Innovations for the week of September 19th

September 18, 2019 | Jim Lane

It seems that plastic is in the news daily between bag bans, straw bans and even Ray-Bans. But there are companies out there tackling the plastic problem with alternatives like the new “Feel the Peel” juicer that turns orange peels into bioplastic cups by drying, milling, and mixing the peels with polylactic acid and 3D […]

Will the RFS Deal Protect Innovation and Our Planet?

September 17, 2019 | Jim Lane

Stephanie Batchelor, Vice President, Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO) Special to The Digest As we speculate on the details and implications of the administration’s renewable fuels deal, the future of an entire green industry hangs in the balance. The debate over the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) has become muddied with rhetoric about special interests and government […]

Joules for Schools: Middlebury College leads trend towards renewable natural gas on the campus

September 16, 2019 | Jim Lane

In Vermont, representatives from Vanguard Renewables, Middlebury College, Vermont Gas, Goodrich Farm, and the State of Vermont were on hand the other day to celebrate the official groundbreaking for the largest anaerobic digester east of the Mississippi, with Middlebury will be the primary consumer of the RNG produced at the dairy farm. But the students […]

Red, blue or pink: Time to think about bioink- Is the pen mightier than the sword? If it’s the right kind of ink

September 15, 2019 | admin

Ink – it’s something we all use. Whether a pen to “ink a deal” or write a quick note, or ink for our printers, it’s something we rely on pretty much every day. Even tattoos use ink so it’s literally all around us and even on us. And nowadays the right ink can be even […]

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