Amyris pulls in $70M for unique biofuel

by merrie | September 20, 2007 at 06:08 pm

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Unlike other cellulosic startups, isn't making ethanol.
Their fuels are hydrocarbons. Calif.-based Amyris, UC Berkeley. They're designed to resemble components
in current gasoline, in petroleum diesel, in jet fuel, says Neil Renninger
co-founder of Amyris Biotechnologies. And Amyris' biofuel may not be
just a green replacement for gasoline or diesel, it may be better.

"]"We expect them to be able to be used at very, very high blends."

Using synthetic biology, Amyris re-programs microbes to function as living factories for the environmentally-friendly production of high-value chemicals.

"We went about the process of identifying, if you had to start from first principals, what would you make as a biofuel?" said Renninger.

"Our skill set, what we bring, is the ability to engineer microbes to make hydrocarbons. That's where our expertise lies. Changing the cellular metabolism, so that instead of, for example, making ethanol, our bugs make hydrocarbons," he said.