Successful conclusion of two internship projects

Over the past year, our laboratory team was enriched by the addition of two talented internship students from Wageningen University: Zhan Paunov and Igor Vunderink.

Both MSc Biotechnology students, albeit with different specializations, they were highly motivated to contribute to the development of sustainable, green bioprocessing technology for a novel biomass: seaweed.

As they successfully complete their projects, we reflect on their research and contributions to GOA Ventures.

Zhan Paunov: Mastering Filtration

GOA Ventures is committed to producing multiple high-value products from fresh seaweed, a high potential and low carbon impact biomass.

Given that seaweed grows in salt water, any process aimed at creating food or feed from seaweed must effectively remove the high salt content. At GOA, we have developed a process to get rid of salt and create a food safe, nutritious protein concentrate.

However, as with any novel technology, we continuously strive to enhance our process to create more and better product.

Zhan joined GOA Ventures with the task of optimizing the purification and concentration steps of our seaweed protein extraction technology.

Building on previous R&D efforts, he conducted numerous filtration trials on our lab-scale unit, fine-tuning machine settings and sample properties to achieve optimal quality and quantity.

His project has significantly advanced our downstream processing of crude seaweed extracts.

goa-ventures-seaweed-intern-zhan

Igor Vunderink: Optimizing Enzyme Efficiency

Our team is dedicated to seaweed processing because we believe in the positive impact of replacing traditional food and energy sources with sustainable seaweed products.

Because of our sustainable mission, avoiding the use of polluting chemicals and high energy inputs is a key focus for us. Our protein extraction process does not involve chemical solvents or strong acids and bases.

Instead, we employ sustainable methods using enzymes: biological molecules that break down seaweed cells to release functional proteins. While enzymes can play a key role in industrial processes, they are sensitive to temperature and the characteristics of the solution in which they need to perform.

Therefore, finetuning the parameters of enzymatic processes is an essential part of our process optimisation. 

Igor’s task was to create the ideal environment for our enzymes to function effectively. Starting at GOA early 2024, he quickly developed a high-throughput experimental method to assess incubation parameters.

Throughout his internship, he performed numerous small-scale extractions, varying one parameter at a time. After determining the optimal values for each parameter in our model species, he validated his results in red, green, and brown seaweeds.

His work has enabled us to extract even more nutritious and functional seaweed protein from fresh biomass and has highlighted promising directions for future research.

goa-ventures-seaweed-intern-igor

Next Generation Biotech

The earth faces immense challenges: increasing population, pollution, and climate change threaten the well-being of future generations. This is why we are dedicated to developing sustainable seaweed-based alternatives for food and energy.

We aim to protect both future generations and our planet. As such, we are delighted to have welcomed some representatives of the next generation into our lab and thank them for their dedication and contributions to our technology.

We wish them the best of luck in their future endeavours in green biotechnology!

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