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The project is supported by €1.7 million of funding from the Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space and will begin on 1 March 2026.
The following text has been machine translated from the German with no human editing.
It's a disrespectful question that slips out of many a mouth in a heated situation: 'Have you been drinking paint?' some people ask when their counterpart says something impossible. What has been said is so abstruse that it can only be explained by major brain damage caused by consuming the toxic liquid.
Christoph Wittmann, a scientist from Saarbrücken, could ensure that paints are manufactured in a significantly different way in the future, with the help of renowned partners from industry and science. 'Commercially used pigments are predominantly manufactured using petrochemicals, i.e. petroleum-based,' says the scientist, whose research focuses on 'replicating' previously environmentally harmful industrial processes using sustainable methods.
This manufacturing process requires a lot of energy and generates a lot of waste products along the individual steps that lead to the finished end product. Paints play an important role in numerous fields of application – from packaging and textiles to cosmetics and food. 'There is also a need for action due to political conditions,' explains the expert. 'The FDA in the USA, the regulatory authority for medicine and food, has already banned the first classic dyes. Manufacturers are therefore desperately searching for alternative methods of producing colours.'
This is precisely the gap that the 'BioChroma' project, funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research for Research, Technology and Space, will address from March onwards. Over a period of three years, scientists at Saarland University will develop microbiological production systems for bio-based pigments on a laboratory scale. From the outset, they will work closely with industry partners BASF SE, MyBiotech and Mercer Rosenthal to further develop the approaches towards industrial implementation – from assessing scalability to application-oriented formulations.
In the BioChroma project, the pigments are produced in specially developed microbial cell factories. In the laboratory, the microorganisms are specifically equipped with metabolic pathways that allow them to synthesise defined dyes efficiently and reproducibly. The approach is based on natural models, but transfers them to a controllable biotechnological process. This opens up a spectrum of bio-based pigments with clearly distinguishable colour characteristics – from warm, golden tones to deep violet nuances. The focus is not on the most striking colour possible, but on the precise adjustment of properties such as purity, stability and functionality.
In the long term, these tailor-made pigments should be able to be used wherever conventional colours reach their limits – for example, because particularly high demands are placed on safety and compatibility. The aim of the project is to 'rethink' colours – not as mere additives, but as functional, nature-inspired materials. Pigments produced by microorganisms from renewable raw materials that can be broken down again at the end of their life cycle.
'BioChroma thus represents a change in paint production: away from petroleum-based processes and towards functional, bio-based pigments that are not only produced sustainably, but also enable new, safe applications – and whose effects can not only be measured, but also seen,' says Christoph Wittmann.
At a glance:
The project 'BioChroma – Microbial refinement of industrial side streams into biodegradable pigments' is funded with around 1.7 million euros by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research for Research, Technology and Space. Around one million euros of this will go to Christoph Wittmann's working group, with a further 500,000 euros going to the working group led by Andriy Luzhetskyy, Professor of Pharmaceutical Biotechnology at Saarland University. The aim of the project is to transfer biotechnological innovations from academic research into industrial applications. The industrial partners BASF SE and MyBiotech (Überherrn) are centrally involved in the scaling, evaluation and implementation of the pigments; the kraft pulp manufacturer Mercer Rosenthal is involved as an associated partner. The project will start on 1 March 2026 and will run for 36 months.
Further information:
Prof. Dr. Christoph Wittmann
Tel.: (0681) 30271971
Email: christoph.wittmann(at)uni-saarland.de
www.isbio.de