2009 BRAIN
Second SEC Technology Tour to Zwingenberg
The Senior Expert Chemists (SEC), together with the retirees from the VAA plant group at the Wolfgang Industrial Park (Hanau), met in Zwingenberg on the Bergstrasse on 16 June 2009 for the second SEC Technology Tour. After a tour of Zwingenberg, they began the climb to Auerbach Castle through the vineyards, where Riesling thrives on granite-rich soil. It is precisely this terroir that gives Bergstrasse wine the mineral freshness for which it is so popular.
A knowledgeable guide provided information about the castle and the history of the Middle Ages at Auerbach Castle. The Counts of Katzenelnbogen built the mighty castle in 1222 to secure their revenues along the Bergstrasse against the powerful Electorate of Mainz. When the dynasty died out in 1479, its considerable wealth passed to the Landgraviate of Hesse. By now, in glorious weather, the retirees refreshed themselves with a picnic in the castle courtyard before setting off on the return journey to Zwingenberg.
In Zwingenberg, Holger Zinke and Martin Langer from BRAIN (Biotechnology Research and Information Network) were waiting for them. The company is a pioneer and a leader in white biotechnology. This field uses nature’s entire toolbox to replace conventional chemical-industry processes with more environmentally friendly biological methods. Zinke, a molecular geneticist with a doctorate, is Chairman of the Board of Brain and was awarded the German Environmental Award in 2008 [Nachr. Chem. 2008,56,1157].
The visitors learned in the most impressive way about the immense diversity of chemical processes that take place in nature. For example, in a microorganism called Acidanus ambivalens, which feels at home at 80° C and a pH value of 2.5. It has a cell membrane that is unusual, if functional, and produces, among other things, the same amino acids inside itself as higher organisms. And that is not all: it needs nothing but sulphur, carbon dioxide and ammonia to live. This makes seasoned industrial chemists sit up and take notice: a whole range of chemical processes based on CO2, with sulphur as the only energy source!
Or take termites, which are famously dependent exclusively on wood, although they are actually — like us humans — unable to digest the components of wood. To achieve this, they cultivate microorganisms in their digestive tract that produce cellulases and hemicellulases to break down the wood. Naturally, these microorganisms are passed on from generation to generation!
The particular expertise of BRAIN’s employees lies in their ability to extract the DNA of numerous organisms from any given sample with exceptional care and analyse its sequence. Even if the organisms themselves are, for the most part, impossible to cultivate, their DNA fragments can be cloned and stored in a format that allows screening at any time. A core element of Brain is therefore a very rapidly growing metagenomic library, currently containing 200 million clones. They encode a wealth of new enzymes or entire metabolic processes — precisely that toolbox of nature.
The list of BRAIN’s cooperation partners reads like a Who’s Who of the chemical and biochemical industry. Together with them, BRAIN is working on projects such as detergent enzymes that break down dirt particles at 40°C instead of 60 °C. In Germany alone, this would mean a reduction in CO2 emissions of 1.3-106 t!
The visitors would also like to express their special thanks to Holger Zinke and Martin Langer in this way. They made a substantial contribution to ensuring that the excursion to the early-summer Bergstrasse included a scientific highlight. This was also demonstrated by the seniors’ enthusiasm for discussion at BRAIN, even though they had already completed a hike lasting almost four hours. The outing concluded with hands-on and tastable biochemistry at the “Goldener Löwe”, the historic home of the Simon-Bürkle winery in Zwingenberg.
Wolfgang Gerhartz
