Welcome to CBiRC

The Center for Biorenewable Chemicals (CBiRC) is developing the tools, components and materials needed to transform carbohydrate feedstocks into bio-based chemicals (video). Core know-how and technologies include bioengineering of fatty acid and polyketide biochemistry in microorganisms, as well as an innovative and complimentary portfolio of developments in chemical catalysis. By combining biocatalysis and chemical catalysis CBiRC creates new know-how and powerful systems that have the potential to nurture a sustainable bio-based chemical industry. CBiRC believes the existing petrochemical supply chain can be transformed with key bio-based foundational intermediates that deliver an array of drop-in chemistry or similar functionality to existing fossil-carbon-based chemicals.

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Modified bacteria turn waste into fat for fuel

“Green” chemistry developed at Rice University is at the center of a new government effort to turn plant waste into fatty acids, and then into fuel. The Rice lab of bioengineer Ka-Yiu San is part of a recently announced $25 million United States Department of Agriculture project to develop a new generation of renewable energy [...]

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NSF adds three years with $12 million in funding

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has added $12 million and another three years of support to the NSF Engineering Research Center for Biorenewable Chemicals based at Iowa State University. The continuing support brings federal investment in the center up to $30.5 million over eight years. The center’s vision is to transform the industrial chemical industry [...]

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Wurtele receives Iowa’s Women of Innovation Award

CBiRC faculty affiliate, Eve Syrkin Wurtele, was awarded the Woman of Innovation award for Research Innovation and Leadership by the Technology Association of Iowa (TAI) at their fifth annual DuPont Pioneer Iowa Women of Innovation event held on November 15, 2012 in Des Moines. This is the second consecutive year Dr. Wurtele was a finalist [...]