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The technology could reduce reliance on soy-based protein feed for livestock.
Researchers in Germany have developed a solar-powered process that produces amino acids, the building blocks of proteins, from carbon dioxide, hydrogen and methanol.
The technology was developed by scientists at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). They believe it can provide a more sustainable way to manufacture amino acids for livestock feed and cultured meat production.
According to the team, the innovation comes at a time when global demand for food is set to surge by roughly 60 percent by 2050. In contrast, new agricultural land is projected to increase by only about two percent.
The method could also reduce dependence on research-intensive agriculture. “In the long term, this approach could help make more productive use of available land and enable a more sustainable production of amino acids,” Volker Sieber, PhD, a professor of chemistry of biogenic resources and TUM Campus Straubing rector, said.
The system works by converting solar energy into electricity through photovoltaic (PV) systems. This electricity is then used to produce hydrogen, which is combined with captured CO2 to create methanol, a widely used industrial chemical.
Meanwhile, specialized enzymes subsequently convert the methanol through a series of reactions into amino acids. For the project, the team demonstrated the production of seven amino acids, including glycine, serine, L-alanine, L-aspartic acid, L-valine, L-glutamic acid, and L-proline. The choice of enzymes determines which amino acid is produced in the process.
According to the team, the approach offers an alternative to relying on plants as the primary source of protein production. “Plants use sunlight to build biomass, but they are relatively inefficient at doing so,” Sieber stated. “We are investigating an alternative pathway in which renewable energy is first converted into chemical energy carriers and then into valuable protein building blocks.”
The modular platform builds on the team’s 2023 work, when they produced the L-alanine amino acid from green methanol. “What started with a single amino acid is increasingly evolving into a platform technology for producing protein building blocks from renewable energy,” Vivian Willers, PhD, a researcher at TUM, pointed out.
Viktoria Lehmann, a PhD researcher at TUM, revealed that dairy cows need amino acid-enriched feed to sustain high milk production. Meanwhile, millions of tons of these protein-building blocks are used in livestock feed each year.
“However, their production consumes large amounts of land, water, and other resources,” Lehmann explained. “We wanted to find a more resource-efficient way to meet this protein demand.”
But according to the researchers, the technology could have applications beyond livestock feed. Amino acids are also essential ingredients in nutrient media used to grow cultivated meat. The process could also reduce reliance on protein-rich feed ingredients like soy, which is often associated with significant land use and environmental impacts.
For now, the technology remains at the proof-of-concept stage. Even though the team successfully demonstrated the complete production chain, the output is still too low for commercial deployment. They now intend to make the methanol-converting enzymes more efficient.
“Our work is primarily a proof of technological feasibility,” Sieber concluded in a press release. “We have shown that a broad range of biologically relevant amino acids can be produced from CO2-based methanol.”
The study has been published in the journal Nature Communications.
Based in Skopje, North Macedonia. Her work has appeared in Daily Mail, Mirror, Daily Star, Yahoo, NationalWorld, Newsweek, Press Gazette and others. She covers stories on batteries, wind energy, sustainable shipping and new discoveries. When she's not chasing the next big science story, she's traveling, exploring new cultures, or enjoying good food with even better wine.
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