US-based The Live Green Company is building a precision fermentation division set to replace animal, synthetic and ultra-processed ingredients with plant-based alternatives. With its proprietary artificial intelligence (AI) software, the company will boost the functionality and sustainability of the products developed and expand beyond the current ingredients and fungi hosts to give F&B players more options.
Precision fermentation technology harnesses microbes to create specific ingredients and products in a highly scalable manner.
“The precision fermentation industry currently relies on a single fungal host, Trichoderma, and there’s a huge need to tailor the machinery of other fungi as per the food industry’s requirements to produce the ingredients of interest in higher amounts much faster, with fewer resources and in a more sustainable way,” explains Dr. Kavish Kumar, researcher at Live Green.
The sector is aware of the need to research and expand into the fungal space, with players pioneering fungal fermentation joining last November to create The Fungal Protein Association.
AI to crack the puzzle
There are 450,000 plant species and over 10 million natural compounds. Such a gargantuan amount of plant species creates the need to rely on AI technology, such as Live Green’s Charaka.
The company substituted these ingredients with things like sunflower proteins, fiber and fat, banana, avocado and flax meal. It concludes this switch didn’t change the product’s taste, texture or mouthfeel in 90 days.
“Charaka’s algorithms analyze intricate data – such as organoleptic, taxonomy, phytochemical compounds, bioactive molecules, nutritional profiles, physicochemical and mechanical properties and molecular analysis – of various plants using sophisticated deep machine learning systems to discover hidden and non-linear relationships and predict innovative functionalities and uses,” explains the company.
While there are hundreds of thousands of plants, industry relies on a couple thousand of them. In an interview with FoodIngredientsFirst, Dan Saladino, author of “Eating to Extinction: The World’s Rarest Foods and Why We Need to Save Them,” spoke extensively about the detriment of monoculture and shared evidence of its impact gathered from his global travels.
Live Green’s Charaka has, additionally, a database of thousands of plant-only ingredients and proteins. Using the food tech solution also allows for faster, cost-effective and sustainable innovation.
“We have set up our Precision Fermentation division in record time and at a fraction of the cost, complete with a team of skilled PhDs, a lab with 100 liters of fermentation capacity, and partnerships with internationally reputed institutes like ICGEB (International Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotech) and some CROs (contract research organizations),” says Rajan Pillay, executive chairman of Live Green.
Green technology
Live Green affirms that 80% of the 5 billion hectares of land currently used for animal farming and crop production could be regained through technologies like precision fermentation.
“Compared to conventional agricultural protein production, precision fermentation needs 1,700 times less land and requires up to 138,000 and 157,000 times less land than beef and lamb production, respectively. In addition, it can be run in any facility using renewable energy, significantly reducing the carbon footprint of new plant-only proteins and food ingredients,” explains the business.
The company flags how it will solve “one of World Economic Forum’s (WEF) greatest concerns,” wildlife decline.
The WEF The Global Risks Report 2023, released last week, explains how the ongoing affordability and food availability crisis is at odds with the efforts to conserve and restore biodiversity.
Dawn of precision fermentation era in food
Live Green has used Charaka to replace milk, eggs, emulsifiers and anti-freezing and anti-caking agents in ice cream.
This might be the year for precision fermentation as companies tap into the boundless potential of the technology.
“Despite microbial fermentation’s long history in food and industrial biotechnology, tremendous potential for innovation remains untapped,” explains the Good Food Institute.
“The vast biological diversity of microbial species, coupled with virtually limitless biological synthesis capabilities, translates to immense opportunity for novel alternative protein solutions to emerge from fermentation-based approaches.”
Last week, FrieslandCampina Ingredients announced its partnership with Triplebar Bio to develop and scale up the production of cell-based proteins via the technology. The alliance aims to develop innovative alternative protein solutions that improve human health, target infant nutrition and reduce reliance on traditional protein sources.
“The potential of precision fermentation is huge,” Anne Peter Lindeboom, managing director of innovation at FrieslandCampina, told.
In other moves, Danish aroma company EvodiaBio secured US$6.4 million in a capital raise as part of its strategy to become a key global industry player in sustainable aroma production for the food and beverage industry. It recently introduced a technology platform that uses precision fermentation to produce these sustainable aromas.
Meanwhile, start-ups are increasingly turning to precision fermentation to create an alternative to unsustainable palm oil.
