Hydrocow project: Solar Foods develops milk protein from CO2 and renewable electricity

06 Sep 2023 --- Solar Foods will use genetic engineering to develop a novel biotechnology platform for producing milk protein from CO2 and electricity to open new ways for sustainable food production. The company and its academic partners have received funding worth €5.5million (US$5.9 million) from the European Innovation Council (EIC) to work on a four-year project called Hydrocow.

The Finland-based company is leading a consortium as part of the “Hydrocow project” which also involves the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, RWTH Aachen University in Germany and FGen, a subsidiary of Ginkgo Bioworks in Switzerland.

As the first application of the platform, the consortium will genetically engineer a hydrogen oxidizing bacteria (HOB) to excrete beta-lactoglobulin naturally, the major whey protein in cow’s milk, says the company.

“If successful, this microbial platform could be used to convert CO2 into usable ingredients like, lactoferrin, casein, enzymes or other proteins with different functionalities. These ingredients would serve the food and beverage industry and reduce their carbon footprint,” Dr. Arttu Luukanen, SVP at Solar Foods and the project coordinator tells Food Ingredients First. 

“Hydrocow could lead to the creation of truly ground-breaking technology for the food industry.”

Setting the wheels in motion
Solar Foods and its academic partners are working in tandem to build the protein production platform with a Design-Build-Test-Learn cycle, which includes designing a comprehensive metabolic model for the HOB at RWTH Aachen University.

“We will modify a microbe that can naturally grow on CO2 and hydrogen manufactured using electricity."Further, the company notes that the University of Groningen will implement the “model-informed designs” by modern genetic modification techniques aimed at incorporating the intra-cellular protein secretion mechanism into the HOB.

The test phase will follow this to utilize the ultra-high speed screening platform of FGen to select the best-performing strains for protein secretion rapidly. 

“The selected strains will be validated by Solar Foods in autotrophic growth conditions for protein secretion, followed by downstream processing.” 

“We will modify a microbe that naturally already holds the capacity to grow on CO2 and hydrogen manufactured using electricity to secrete food proteins. The project will use several approaches, but the main idea is to build a secretion pathway inside the cell to enable protein export from the cell.”

The method will reportedly “streamline the metabolic pathways” so that the cell invests the hydrogen-derived energy and CO2 for making the desired product.

Last year, the company received regulatory approval for its microbial protein-rich powder, Solein, made using CO2 and electricity in a bioprocess. 

“We have filed for novel food dossier for Solein in other key markets as well,” Dr. Luukanen reveals.

Why HOB?
Research says that HOBs are prime candidates for the sustainable production of microbial protein because of their high nutritional value and simple metabolic requirements, which could allow a simple resource recycling of ammonium ions (NH4+) and CO2 into a valuable product.

Dr. Pasi Vainikka, CEO with Dr. Juha-Pekka Pitkänen, CTO at Solar Foods.“HOBs are at the core of Solar Foods’ business and research around this group of bacteria is of particular interest to us. Protein secretion from a HOB would enable hydrogen and CO2 valorization to a variety of products, not only as Single Cell Protein (SCP),” states Dr. Luukanen.

“Beta-lactoglobulin was chosen to be the first protein to attempt secretion with, but the same engineering principles could be applied to almost any protein-based product,” he adds.

Studies also state that the technology fixes carbon dioxide into products without the light requirements of agriculture and biotech that rely on primary producers such as plants and algae. 

It also promises higher growth rates, drastically less land, fresh water and mineral requirements.

Previously, SCP production from autotrophic bacteria that CO2 into their cellular biomass has been a popular subject for scientists.

Pressure on natural resources drives innovation
According to the WWF, with the rising demand for animal-based dairy, there is growing pressure on natural resources. Moreover, unsustainable dairy farming and feed production can lead to the loss of ecologically important areas, such as prairies, wetlands and forests.

Dr. Luukanen concurs: “Traditional dairy farming has harmed the environment by contributing to climate change through greenhouse gas emissions, land use for grazing and feed crops, water consumption and pollution and biodiversity loss.”

Last year, the company received regulatory approval for its microbial protein-rich powder, Solein, made using CO2 and electricity.“These environmental issues are prompting efforts to adopt more sustainable practices within the dairy industry and explore alternative dairy sources like plant-based and cell-cultured options to mitigate these impacts.”

Food formulators like Eat Just increasingly focus on developing animal-free protein by leveraging food science.

Earlier this year, Nestlé launched a milk alternative made from a blend of oat and fava.

Dr. Luukanen comments on this trend: “The current research and commercial activities focus on animal-free protein production, for example, milk protein production without the cow and egg protein without the chicken with the use of microbes. Companies like Perfect Day are making this a reality for consumers already in certain markets.”

“However, we are taking things one step further by not just removing the animal from the equation but removing all arable land from the equation by trying to build a protein production platform that takes CO2 directly as input for the protein instead of sugar or other higher-value carbon sources that heterotrophic microbes prefer,” he concludes.

By Insha Naureen