The three major star ingredients "cabbage price": sugar substitutes, bone health, ergotamine, synthetic biology has affected whose cheese?

1. D-Aloulose: Refactoring the sugar industry pattern. D-Aloulose, which contains only 0.01% in figs, was once considered a "laboratory treasure" due to its high extraction cost.

The early patent layout of Tailai and Songgu Chemical has made it a "technological highland" in the field of sugar substitutes.

The breakthrough of domestic enterprises began with enzymatic conversion technology. The efficient utilization of D-alloketose-3-isomerase allows fructose to be directly converted into the target product under mild conditions, reducing by-products by over 60%.

Nowadays, this sugar substitute with a sweetness of 70% of sucrose and only 1/10 of its calorie content has been widely used in baking and beverage industries in North America.

With the approval of the new food ingredient status in China by 2025, a large number of enterprises are accelerating their expansion plans, and a "sweetness revolution" in the sugar substitute industry is imminent.

The traditional production of vitamin K2 has long been monopolized by chemical synthesis methods. Although MK-4 products are low-cost, their bioavailability is less than 10%.

The discovery of Bacillus subtilis natto completely changed this situation.

Liquid high-density fermentation technology enables Bacillus subtilis to efficiently synthesize MK-7 in optimized culture medium.

Through multi-stage membrane separation and purification, the proportion of all trans structures in the product reaches 99.95%, and the activity is more than three times that of chemically synthesized products.

This fermented source of vitamin K2 can accurately guide calcium deposition into bones rather than blood vessels, demonstrating unique advantages in bone health products.

Once upon a time, the price of one kilogram of ergotamine was equivalent to a property in a first tier city.

German companies monopolize the market through natural extraction patents, and domestic enterprises import raw materials at a cost of over 40% of their end products. This monopoly has been completely broken by synthetic biology.

By editing the metabolic pathway of Escherichia coli, ergothionein, which originally needed to be extracted from edible mushrooms, can be mass-produced through fermentation tanks. The purity exceeds 99%, and the fermentation cycle has been shortened from the traditional 14 days to 5 days.

The price avalanche brought about by technological breakthroughs is particularly astonishing - from 30 million yuan/kg to 9000 yuan/kg, a decrease of over 300 times.

With the advancement of new food ingredient declarations, this natural antioxidant is penetrating from high-end skincare products to oral beauty foods, ushering in the era of "democratization" in the anti-aging market.

When technologies such as synthetic biology, automated fermentation, and precision purification come together, the production of functional raw materials is undergoing changes in three dimensions:

In terms of cost dimension, by shortening processes and improving efficiency, scarce components can enter the mass market with reduced dimensions;

The quality dimension has shifted from "meeting standards" to "maximizing activity", such as the emergence of all trans MK-7 and high-purity ergothionein;

Application dimension, expanding from a single field to multiple scenarios, such as D-aloulose can be used as a sugar substitute and can also optimize the flavor of baked goods through Maillard reaction.

It can be foreseen that in the next five years, more "once scarce" functional components will be mass-produced through biological fermentation technology.

This industrial revolution driven by synthetic biology will ultimately shift health products from "concept marketing" to "technology driven", bringing consumers truly valuable functional experiences.