生物基产品的发展

生物世界是合成不出不可降解的物质的，但随着19世纪有机合成化学技术的引入，合成的有机化合物还没有进化和适应到可以实现其分解活动。这样，今天就出现了大量的污染问题。对这些非自然的合成物质的适应过程是漫长的 ，但生物技术大大缩减了解决这些问题的时间。

虽然很多农业副产品是天然的，但它们的使用和处理问题对社会来说仍是一个挑战。目前，数量众多的农业副产品只能回归土地作为肥料，土壤改良剂，或者加工为动物或鱼类的饲料、加工成燃料作为能量供给使用，又或投放于可以增加附加值的过程中。农业副产品通常包含碳水化合物等物质，例如，谷物浸泡水，糖蜜和牛奶乳清， 动物组织中的蛋白质，脂质以及谷物，还有油脂中的脂质和油。纤维主要是碳水化合物的高级形式，如纤维素和半纤维素。酒精发酵产品包含了一系列的微生物营养盐和发酵残留物，如谷物蛋白和干碾磨谷物的外壳。

日益增多的生物技术活动也带来了提升废物处理系统的能力和复杂性的责任。生物产品加工和农副产品为工业及其相关地区同时带来了问题也是机遇。一项由美国政府会计署，环境保护署和水环境联合会共同组织的研究调查表明，由于过多的农业和食品加工废水，许多美国的城市污水处理厂都不能满足水排放标准。1980年，美国Cedar Rapids市大力发展农副产品加工产业，但因污水处理厂的规模有限而不得不有所节制。后来一个由两所Iowa州立研究大学的老师，Cedar Rapids市污水处理厂的有关人员和美国农业部组成的一个协会，上述问题才最终被解决。有人提议将协会中的Cedar Rapids市污水处理厂的有关专家和两所Iowa州立研究大学的老师结合起来，携手解决关于农业和食品加工产生的副产品的问题。这不仅是地区性问题，而且还是国家性问题。这个协作自1989年以来一直运行着，它的本意是研究发酵和生物技术产生 的副产品的，但是协会的注意力迅速转移到寻找一些新的可以转变成高附加值的产品。这项研究利用了生物催化剂对特殊转变的选择性和反应活性。就这方面来说，Cedar Rapids市面对的机遇和挑战，连同生物技术都是国际大环境下的一个缩影。

附原文：

Development of biobased products

The biological world does not synthesize materials that it cannot decompose, but with the introduction of organic chemical syntheses in the 19th century, products were formed quickly for which organisms had not evolved, had not adapted, to effect their decomposition. Thus many problems of pollution exist today. The process of adaptation to these unnatural compounds is frequently prolonged, a delay that is now being reduced
by advances in biotechnology.

Although many byproducts in agricultural industries are natural, their use or disposal has challenged society. A number of byproducts and coproducts of agricultural businesses are presently returned to the land as fertilizers or soil modifiers, fed to animals or fish as nutrients, burnt for energy, or applied to value-added conversions. The byproducts usually contain carbohydrate, in such byproducts as corn steep water, molasses or milk whey, proteins and lipids in animal tissues and cereal grains, and lipid in greases and oils. Fibers are principally carbohydrate in some complex form, such as celluloses and hemicelluloses. Fermentation liquors contain a complex of microbial nutrient salts and residuals from the fermentation, such as corn protein and hulls from alcohol fermentation of dry-milled corn.

With the dramatic increase in biotechnological activity comes a concomitant responsibility to increase the capacity and sophistication of waste management systems. Byproducts of biotechnological processes and agribusinesses will always pose both problems and opportunities for industries and the geographic areas associated with them. Surveys conducted by the US Government Accounting Office and Environmental Protection Agency, and the Water Environment Federation indicate that many municipal wastewater treatment plants in the USA are not meeting their effluent discharge limits because they are overloaded with agricultural and food-processing effluents. In the 1980s the City of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA, was expanding its agribusinesses, with a potential limit being placed by the size of its water treatment plant. The problem was attacked by forming a consortium that included faculty from the two research universities in the State of Iowa, the Cedar Rapids Water Treatment Plant personnel and the United States Department of Agriculture. It was proposed that the expertise of the City of Cedar Rapids and faculty members at the University of Iowa and Iowa State University be brought together in a consortium (biotechnology byproducts consortium (BBC)) to tackle the treatment of agricultural and food-processing byproducts, not only as a local but also as a national problem. This collaboration has continued since 1989. The initial intent was to study fermentation and biotechnological byproducts, but the attention of the BBC quickly turned to searching also for conversion processes of inherently low-value (or poorly characterized) raw materials into value-added products. The research activities take advantage of the selectivity and reactivity of biocatalysts for unique transformations. In this respect, the problems and opportunities associated with biotechnology in Cedar Rapids are a microcosm of a larger international context.