Industrial bioscience includes the processes used to convert biological materials into useful products for use in a wide range of applications including food stuffs, oils, materials and chemicals.

It involves processing bio materials in sufficiently large volumes to bring down the cost of processing and ensure a viable market for producers of raw materials.

Sustainability

The interest is in sustainability, producing less pollution and reducing dependence on expensive and increasingly rare resources. The results are substitute products for more environmentally unfriendly equivalents such as oil and petroleum products.

Some products weigh less, have greater mechanical flexibility and release less toxic vapors. Spin-offs into other industries include cosmetics, food and drink and transport.

In addition to production process design the underpinning technologies include biocatalysts’, system modeling to understand the processes required to convert the raw materials to usable end products.

The UK has strong capabilities in bioscience through a combination of academic research and a mix of small and medium-sized companies operating in industrial biotechnology.