FMRG: Eco: CAS-Climate: Sustainable Manufacturing Using Living Organisms and Agriculturally Derived Materials

This Future Manufacturing Research Grant in Ecomanufacturing will generate knowledge that enables 3D printing-based methods to manufacture environmentally friendly products using living organisms (algae, bacteria, and fungi) and agriculturally derived materials (biomass and corn plastics). Different from petroleum-based plastics, agriculturally derived materials are biodegradable and abundant on this planet.

However, they have been grossly undervalued and misused. For example, biomass is generally considered solid waste that is downcycled to fire fuel or fertilizer, or shipped to landfills. Inspired by biological systems that involve living cells to bind and metabolize biomass, the team proposes a new manufacturing method by harnessing living organisms to bind agriculturally derived materials and 3D printing products using living-cell bridged biocomposites.

These products have broad applications in packaging, furniture, construction, and even space habitats. The widespread use of the new method will make many products and their manufacturing more environmentally friendly, create domestic manufacturing-related jobs, and use more materials readily available in the United States. Additionally, the project has an integrated education and workforce development plan to train the future workforce through a variety of activities, such as developing a new course and textbook on Ecomanufacturing using living organisms, establishing a website related to Ecomanufacturing, involving undergraduate students in research, upskilling workforce through collaboration with 2-year colleges and industry, and conducting both formative and summative evaluations on these activities.

The project aims to understand the science of 3D printing-based manufacturing methods using living organisms and agriculturally derived materials. The central hypothesis is that modulating interactions between living organisms and agriculturally derived materials via advanced manufacturing processes will lead to reliable manufacturing of products from sustainable biocomposites.

Driven by this hypothesis, the team will take experimental, theoretical, and computational approaches to systematically study the effects of manufacturing processes on printability, cell viability, physical properties, recyclability, degradability, and full life-cycle analysis of the products manufactured using biocomposites. The entire manufacturing lifecycle of the new 3D printing-based method will be considered, including feedstock material production, service, and end-of-life, as well as energy consumption, health and environmental impact, and cost effectiveness.

Convergence research will be performed by a team with expertise in biology, engineering, and educational administration, with collaboration from industry. This Future Manufacturing award was supported by the Division of Civil, Mechanical and Manufacturing Innovation, the Division of Materials Research, the Division of Engineering Education and Centers, and the Division of Undergraduate Education.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.