Start
May 04, 2016 - 11:00
End
May 04, 2016 - 12:00
Venue
Room 240 Chemical Engineering
Event Type
Speaker
Dr. Hari Sunkara DuPont Industrial BioSciences Experimental Station Wilmington DE 19803
Title
Building Bio Based Economy via Creating High Performance Biomaterials
Abstract: As global population is increasing at a rapid rate we anticipate that the demand for energy grows significantly but the supply of fossil fuels may not grow proportionately. Besides our society is in need of sustainable cleaner technologies that can generate considerably less greenhouse gas emissions without impacting global climate change. With a vision for a sustainable bio-based economy DuPont has been making a great deal of efforts relentlessly over two decades on the development of bio-based products materials and fuels using renewable sourced ingredients. In driving towards this vision we partnered with Genencor and Tate & Lyle and commercialized the ground breaking technology of the microbial production of 1 3-propanediol (BioPDO) in a recombinant E. Coli strain and demonstrated the use of Bio PDO in many industrial and personal care applications. In 1950s DuPont commercialized thermoplastic recyclable polyester polyethylene terephthalate (PET) using fossil fuel based feedstocks such as ethylene glycol and dimethyl terephthalate and branded as Dacron for fiber and Mylar for film. Today PET is one of the world's most commonly used versatile and trusted materials with a global demand of 20 million tonnes. 50 years later we have developed specialty polymers such as Sorona (polytrimethylene terephthalate) polymer for fiber and 100% bio based polyether polyols using Bio PDO instead of petrochemical propanediol. Today this sustainable bio-based technology platform not only is bringing significant revenue (~$300 million per year) to the corporation but also helping to reduce the environmental footprints. In this presentation I will narrate how we have created this biomaterial platform using Bio-PDO as a building block successfully and thereby helping to build the bio-based economy for the future.About the speaker: Dr. Sunkara is currently a Senior Principal Investigator in DuPont Industrial BioSciences Business unit. He received his Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry in 1989 from University of Madras India. He joined DuPont Nylon Intermediate and Polymer Business unit in 1997 after working at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville Alabama. Since then he devoted his DuPont career in advancing the frontier of the “white biotechnology” area with focused efforts on development bio-based materials as substitutions for petroleum-sourced incumbents. During his 19 years with DuPont he has played a significant role in promoting the “greening of DuPont” through many scientific contributions to corn and soy agricultural feedstocks based materials:Bio-PDO Sorona Cerenol Polyols Hytrel RS Imron Industrial Strength Bio based plasticizers Plenish High Oleic Soybean Oil based dielectric fluids and tannin based rigid insulation foams. He is the principal Inventor in more than 140 US Patent applications issued/pending some of which were licensed to European and Asian countries. He is also contributor to many publications and presentations. Dr. Sunkara is recipient of 2013 ACS national award for Affordable Green Chemistry. His current research focus is on developing 100% bio based poly(trimethylene furandicarboxylate) resin for packaging industry.