Cristian Bolaño Losada has researched how we can use a type of fungus, called Mucoromycota, to produce oils and other useful products in a sustainable way. He used Norwegian spruce as feedstock for the fungus.
Cristian Bolaño Losada's doctoral work shows that oils and by-products can be produced sustainably through Mucoromycota fungal fermentation using Norwegian spruce as feedstock. The thesis is part of the work at the research center Bio4Fuels, which aims to develop sustainable biofuels and energy in Norway.
Losada's work is part of the biochemical conversion work package, which involves using biological processes to obtain compounds for biofuels. Here, various Norwegian feedstocks and conversion technologies are evaluated and studied.
"We use fungi from the phylum Mucoromycota, which shows an exceptional ability to transform large amounts of sugar into intracellular oils. These oils vary in composition depending on the species: some are rich in omega-3 or -6 for nutraceutical applications, while others are more suitable for biodiesel production", says Losada.
For biodiesel production, these tiny creatures need to be fed with sugar. And where this sugar comes from is important.
"It is problematic to use sugar from crops or other food sources to produce biofuel due to concerns that it will negatively affect the food supply", says Losada.
Therefore, researchers are looking at other sources to find sugar to feed the fungi. And forest biomass is a source of sustainable sugars.
"Our research shows that Norwegian spruce is suitable as feedstock to produce microbial oils from Mucoromycota", says Losada.
Specifically, the researchers used processed material from Norwegian spruce in both liquid (hydrolysate) and solid (pulp) form. The biomass was obtained from Borregaard's BALITM process.
The fungi can also produce other useful products
It is rarely economically feasible to focus solely on biofuels. Therefore, Losada also investigated other high-value products these fungi can produce—such as organic acids, enzymes, and chitosan.
This positions the fungi as promising candidates for future biorefineries, says Losada.
In addition, he explored ways to simplify and reduce the costs of the production process, for example by conducting saccharification and fermentation simultaneously. In this way, the enzymatic breakdown of wood into simple sugars and fungal fermentation are carried out in a single process.
"Since enzymes and fungi often have different optimal conditions, we have also evaluated fungal traits that make it easier to find a "sweet spot" of conditions", says Losada.
He used vibrational spectroscopy techniques to monitor the bioconversion process. These techniques provide comprehensive biochemical information about the sample, enabling rapid detection of significant changes while also being industrially applicable.
Although Mucoromycota fungi are biotechnologically relevant, there is a lack of knowledge about their biology.
"Our work has uncovered new biological insights from representative species of this phylum, including how they direct carbon to different products and secrete organic acids that had previously gone unnoticed. These discoveries will help make fungal-based biorefineries a reality", says Losada.
Cristian Bolaño Losada will defend his doctoral thesis "Exploring lignocellulose-based fermentation for sustainable co-production of lipids and other valuable chemicals by Mucoromycota fungi" on April 25, 2025. Read more about the event here.