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2019 Annual Report
Objectives
1: Enable commercial processes for transforming animal protein into new marketable flocculants.
1a. Develop processing techniques for the solubilization of rendered protein with emphasis on intact proteins and high molar mass protein fragments.
1b. Evaluate technological alternatives for transforming raw chicken blood into a high potency flocculant at low processing cost.
2: Enable market growth for flocculants based on animal proteins by improving their performance and expanding their market applications.
2a. Apply a series of covalent modification strategies to improve blood and rendered protein flocculant performance.
2b. Identify particular application areas to which blood and rendered protein flocculants are well suited.
Approach
Both rendered protein and chicken blood have inherent flocculant properties, but these substances also have other properties which make them unsuitable for commercial flocculant applications in their ‘raw’ state. Poor solubility is a primary obstacle to commercial utilization of rendered protein as a flocculant. Instability, high water content, and dark red color are among the obstacles to blood utilization. The project will focus on developing processing techniques for surmounting these obstacles under Objective 1. With the current state-of-the-art, rendered protein or blood flocculants have significant performance limitations. Improving their performance through covalent modifications is the focus of Objective 2a. Finally, any class of flocculants is well suited to some particular application areas and not to other areas. In Objective 2b, the focus is on identifying particular application areas appropriate for rendered protein and blood flocculants.
Progress Report
The project focuses on the development and application of protein-based water treatment products, and creating economic impact by transferring the technology developed to industry. It addresses NP306 Action Plan Component 2, Problem Statement 2.A, “Maintain/increase/enhance non-food product (fiber including hides) quality by developing new or improved postharvest technologies/process efficiencies and reducing processing risk.” Over the past year, substantial progress was made towards each of the project’s active objectives. Under Objective 1b, we developed improvements to the process of washing, concentrating, and drying the product of a protein modification reaction. Making the product in a membrane-concentrated liquid form has been proven superior to more expensive dehydration by freeze-drying, and the resultant product fits more readily into end users’ existing liquid dosing systems. This year’s milestone for Objective 2a was the evaluation of an idea to cross-link small peptides into a high molecular weight substance, for the purposes of improving flocculant or adsorbent properties. Although cross-linking by two separate methods was successful, the products did not have the expected improvements in performance. Under a CRADA with a Wisconsin based firm, we adapted ARS protein flocculant product to the recovery of nutrients and solids from liquid manure. This collaboration expanded the scope of our technology, because rather than flocculation, the CRADA partner uses a system in which rising air bubbles carry contaminants away from the clean liquid; the ARS products performed well in this type of system. A separate agreement initiated this year is evaluating the ability of ARS protein flocculants to serve as conditioners in the processing of a wastewater treatment byproduct; the results to date have been promising. Finally, an invention disclosure describing a new method for improving the performance of adsorbents was submitted and approved.
Accomplishments
