Tires from renewable sources like corn cobs and tree branches

Date: February 15, 2017

Country: United States

Application

• Production of renewable polymers which can be used to make car tires.

Description

Car tires are some of the most environmentally unfriendly parts in any car. These are made from natural rubber, which literally grows on trees,  but also isoprene — a key molecule in any tire which is derived from petroleum through a chemical process called ‘cracking’. Developing tires from renewable materials has always been a lofty goal for scientists but despite their best efforts, this has proven extremely challenging until recently. Now, a team from the University of Minnesota claims it has perfected a three-step chemical process that can produce isoprene from renewable biomass such as trees or grasses.

Pathway Description:

Sugars from corn or trees are fermented to create itaconic acid, which is in turn reacted with hydrogen in the presence of a metal-metal catalyst to form methyl-THF (tetrahydrofuran), an intermediate molecule key to synthesizing isoprene.Another catalyst called catalyst called P-SPP (Phosphoros Self-Pillared Pentasil) was used for this task