Perfumes will be produced by microbes

Did you know that to fill another container with aromatic liquid, you need to put in the hard work of extracting vegetable oils from crops that, as luck would have it, grow at the edge of the Earth?.. The modern market for aromatic substances, which is the source of aromas in everything from food and drinks to washing powders and perfumes, depends on the stability of the supply of essential oils. And this shallow stream of raw materials can dry up at any moment: all it takes is some natural disaster or a “color” revolution.

For example, in 2010, the industry was rocked by a shortage of patchouli oil, a fragrance used in the production of many hygiene products and household chemicals. Heavy rains in Indonesia prevented the bush that produces the oil from growing, and the subsequent volcanic eruption and earthquakes further exacerbated the situation…

That’s why the idea of harnessing microbes to produce aromatic oils is gaining popularity. Bitter orange, grapefruit, rose, sandalwood… The list of common fragrances that are the hardest to extract from natural sources is endless. Now, thanks to biotechnology, some of these scents can be produced literally in a petri dish.

Using genetic engineering of microorganisms, biotech companies like Allylix, Isobionics and Evolva are creating GM bacteria and yeast cultures that can produce vegetable oils by enzymatically breaking down sugars. They claim that they can handle absolutely any plant molecule, and that problems will arise only when moving to mass production.

Here are just a few of the aromatic products produced by microbial factories: valencin (citrus scent, the original molecule is found in the peel of Valencian oranges), often used to create fruit drinks and perfumes, nutkatone (grapefruit scent) and, of course, vanilla, which today, fortunately, does not require a trip to Tahiti: microbial fermentation is enough. A little more and we will live in a world of sweet microbial aromas.

But the main thing in this whole story is different. Quietly and unnoticed by ordinary consumers, a completely new biotechnological industry is being formed, the main tool of which will not be a machine or a chemical reactor, but the genetic modification of living organisms, transforming them into biogenetic factories. This has never happened before and on such a scale. The only example of a truly industrial use of bacteria for flavoring can only be the forgotten attempt of biologists in the 1930s, who worked in the country of victorious socialism and the disappearance of butter, to use specially selected lactic acid bacteria to give margarine the taste and smell of butter (for this, a little milk was added to the margarine)...

Well, things have changed since then. You no longer need to add milk to margarine: you just need to reconfigure the genetic code of a couple of bacteria, and they will produce a full range of necessary flavors that will turn even a piece of lard into butter.

Compared to synthetic flavors (copies of natural analogues), products obtained with the help of microbes are more environmentally friendly and can still be considered natural, but our nose will not feel the difference...

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