Research highlights at TransACTS

20 January 2011

At TransACTS, the meeting of the ACTS programmes at January 12 & 13, 2011, all the current ACTS programmes presented a research highlight. Below you will find a summary of each presentation. For more information about TransACTS, please visit www.nwo.nl/acts-symposium.

ASPECT

The ASPECT programme (Advanced Sustainable Processes by Engaging Catalytic Technologies) focuses on enhancing the sustainability of catalytic chemical processes in bulk chemistry. With his lecture on biobased industrial chemicals from glutamic acid, ir. Tijs Lammens of Wageningen University presented one of the highlights of the programme. “Fossil fuels become scarce and ever more expensive, so it is important to look for alternative sources for chemical products”, he explained. “Society tends to focus on transportation fuels, but industrial chemicals such as solvents and polymer precursors encounter the same problems.” Could biomass be the answer? Hypothetically it could, says Lammens. “Biomass might be the ideal starting point for the production of nitrogen containing chemicals, because plant proteins contain nitrogen in the form of the amine groups in amino acids.” Since glutamic acid is the most abundant amino acid in many plant proteins, new routes to convert glutamic acid into industrial chemicals were investigated. At TransACTS Lammens discussed the routes to biobased acrylonitrile, succinonitrile, N-methyl-pyrrolidone (NMP) and N-vinyl-pyrrolidone (NVP). The researchers were successful in producing all four targets from glutamic acids, in a one-pot procedure or in a few steps more. “Glutamic acid can indeed be a platform molecule for a range of chemical products in the future”, Lammens' overall conclusion was. He thanked his colleagues at Wageningen University, Sapienza Università di Roma, DSM and BASF.

PoaC

Prof. dr. Arno Kentgens from Radboud University Nijmegen works within the framework of the Process on a Chip programme. PoaC aims to support new topological concepts that are being developed for the initiation of novel production processes in the areas of food technology, chemistry and life sciences. His research focuses on nuclear magnetic resonance, a fantastic spectroscopic technique for the identification of chemical species. Kentgens: “NMR is broadly applied in many different fields, such as synthetic and supramolecular chemistry, materials science, biology and medicine.” The technology however requires a significant detection volume. Recent developments have shown a focus on reducing NMR detection volume, to make it compatible with microliter and even nanoliter volumes of analytical separation techniques. Miniaturisation of NMR is difficult, Kentgens explains. “Traditionally, NMR on small volumes is performed by means of small solenoids wrapped around a capillary, or planar coils on glass chips containing microfluidic channels. But the nearby copper windings of the rf-coil induce static field distortions that limit the resolution and the Signal to Noise performance.” A different approach was necessary. Kentgens and coworkers and his colleagues at University of Twente, developed an NMR detector based on a rf-stripline. This detector was implemented in a microfluidic chip. Proof of principle experiments in collaboration with IMM partners, and Future Chemistry demonstrated the great potential of this new NMR detector. A microreactor chip was connected to the NMR chip, so that fast chemical reactions can be monitored. It is an impressive step forward but, says Kentgens: “Sensitivity remains an important issue for mass-limited samples. We are now trying to increase the nuclear spin polarization by Dynamic Nuclear Polarization. So far, DNP enhancements up to -95 are obtained. This may open the way for fast in situ NMR analyses of sample quantities down to the picomole regime.”

Sustainable Hydrogen

The Sustainable Hydrogen Programme aims to develop knowledge and technology concepts to facilitate the transition from a society based on fossil fuels to a society using renewable sources. In this world, hydrogen as an energy carrier will play an important role. Dr. Petra de Jongh of Utrecht University was enthusiastic: “The programme concerns both technical and societal aspects. With 146 publications, 8 dissertations and 5 patents so far, it is very successful.” She held a presentation on new strategies towards meeting hydrogen storage goals. “Hydrogen contains three times more energy per kilo than gasoline. The big question is, how to store hydrogen in a compact, safe and reversible way.” Light metal hydrides are promising candidates, but at the moment no material fulfills all requirements simultaneously. “We explore nanosizing and confinement of light metals”, De Jongh says. “We found that for instance Mg can easily be locked in the small pores of a carbon material by melt infiltration. This process is applicable to a broad range of materials. Locking metals in small pores changes the interaction with hydrogen gas.” The challenge is to influence this interaction in such a way that storage and release of H2 can be done fast enough, within an acceptable range of temperatures and for a large number of cycli. "Research results so far are encouraging, and led to fundamental insights that are also applicable in other fields”, De Jongh concludes. She praises the many collaborations that have originated from the Sustainable Hydrogen Programme. At present also the possible valorisation of research results is being explored.

IBOS

The IBOS programme (Integration of Biosynthesis & Organic Synthesis) aims to realise a change of strategy in synthetic chemistry by integrating organic chemistry, modern biochemistry and biotechnology. Prof. dr. Ida van der Klei of University of Groningen held a presentation entitled 'A cell factory for the biosynthesis of complex peptides'. Van der Klei could not elaborate on results, since the data have not yet been published. She had to limit herself to an overview of the aims and objectives of the programme. “There is a growing need for the efficient and sustainable synthesis of complex natural and (semi-)synthetic peptides for pharma and food applications”, she said. This, however, presents a real challenge, since the NRPS systems from which novel complex peptides are designed are very complex. “Also, the development of the field urgently requires efficient NRPS expression systems for the production of complex peptides in bioprocesses”, she said. Penicillium chrysogenum seems to be a suitable host. The filamentous fungus is known for its industrial application in NRPS based antibiotics production. Van der Klei: “We have expertise and know how on this Penicillium, there are robust industrial fermentation characteristics and the genome sequence is known.” In the IBOS programme, research groups of the TU Delft and University of Groningen, together with industrial partner DSM, identify novel NRPS enzymes, engineer these enzymes, develop Penicillium chrysogenum as a host and optimize fermentation. The result will be a new Penicillium based platform for the efficient and sustainable biosynthesis of complex natural and (semi)synthetic peptides.