A team of researchers, including civil & environmental engineering professor & Levenick Center Director Jeremy Guest, have developed an engineered yeast capable of turning urine from wastewater treatment plants into hydroxyapatite (HAp), a high-value bio material found naturally in bone and used widely in dental and surgical applications.
This work, done in collaboration with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California Irvine, builds upon a common trend in biotechnology research that looks to remove harmful compounds found in urine waste and recycle them for use in industry. Most such research has focused on removing ammonia and phosphate for applications in agriculture, but while this work provides large environmental benefits, the economic value is low. Guest and the researchers from the Berkeley Lab and UC Irvine hope their yeast technology's ability to generate HAp will create additional incentive for investment into this new type of recycling.
The paper was recently published in Nature Communications.
More on the development and implementation of the engineered yeast technology can be read in a press release from the Berkeley Lab.