ANIMATIONS
We created an animation clip for CataLight explaining the research center’s work.
Following nature’s example, the CataLight collaborative research center is investigating how to store energy from sunlight and use it, for example to produce solar fuels. The researchers’ goal is to create an artificial membrane that carries out photosynthesis much like a plant leaf. In order to do this, they are developing new photocatalysts and arranging them in a soft matrix in such a way that all processes – from collecting sunlight and transferring energy to removing the hydrogen – run as efficiently as possible.
The animated short clip deals with the idea of shifting the production of high value compounds from rare plants into yeast. The video explains the dilemma of rare plants as carrier of high value substances, as well as the technical concept of the MIAMi.
There are thousands of valuable plant metabolites that we know of – however many of them can not be researched and used due to them only existing in minute amounts in rare, tropical plants. The MIAMi project solves this problem by using synthetic biology to put the plant metabolism directly into yeast.
We created a video that explains the technical concept of pheremone driven pest control to investors, helping our clients to raise funds of more than € 7mio.
Watch how The Olefine Project uses love instead of poison to protect plants from pest insects. One of the most promising alternatives to the harmful insecticides is called “mating disruption”, where small amounts of insect sex pheromones are released in the field to prevent the pest males from finding females. This way females do not get fertilized and can not lay eggs that develop into larvae eating the plants.
SINFONIA: INTRODUCING THE ELEMENT FLUORINE TO THE SYMPHONY OF LIFE
The short film has been produced for SINFONIA.
We created an animated short clip for the project SinFonia. The clip reflects the project’s aims and methods in an entertaining way with musical elements.
Materials containing the element fluorine (F) are extremely important in our modern world, with applications in electronics, healthcare, automotive and wearables. Currently these fluorochemicals are exclusively synthesized using chemical methods. SinFonia wants to change that by using synthetic biology. The project aims to engineer the bacterium Pseudomonas putida to do the job.
Our animation clip “The Beast in Yeast” adresses something that is not very well known: how yeast, such as Candida, can turn into dangerous pathogens.
Yeast infections are poorly understood, difficult to diagnose and are becoming increasingly frequent and serious, affecting over 300 million people worldwide. OPATHY (from Omics of PATHogenics Yeasts) is a European research training network that explores the potential of innovative technologies, including genomics, transcriptomics and proteomics, to study the interactions of yeasts that cause disease to humans. The OPATHIANS develop new diagnostic tools to monitor yeast infections in the clinic, supporting medical doctors and patients worldwide.
SAFE PESTICIDE USE SERIES
30 short films have been produced for UNIDO and the Egyptian Ministry of Agriculture.
Misuse of pesticides causes serious damage to the health of farmers. Radhi, the main character, was designed for an audience in rural Egypt. In order to meet local habits, Biofaction did a local survey in advance, interviewing farmers in Egypt.
Radhi is a sympathetic Antihero that makes all the mistakes, a farmer can possibly do. Therefore Radhi works as the anti-role-model, triggering the desire to avoid these mistakes. The film was produced in English and a local Arabic dialect and broadcasted in local TV and Facebook groups.
We produced a short clip for our EU funded project eForFuel, explaining the technical concept of fuel production using CO2 and genetically modified bacteria. The animation is designed to be smooth, flowing and easy to understand for general public and was distributed on project’s website, social media and by the project partners.
eForFuel develops an industrial biotechnology solution that uses electricity and microorganisms to convert CO2 into hydrocarbon fuels, thus providing a sustainable replacement of fossil carbons. It uses the advantages of different disciplines to establish an efficient process, which sets the stage for a future environmentally, economically, and societally sustainable value chain to produce renewable chemicals and fuels.
Tobacco can become good for your health! This animation shows you how, by explaining the project aims of our EU funded project NEWCOTIANA.
Plant molecular farming is a young branch of biotechnology that works with engineered or specifically bred plants in order to produce cosmetic or pharmaceutical substances – including skin moisturizer, antibodies and vaccines. NEWCOTIANA is doing just that – and with plants you wouldn’t initially connect with health topics: tobacco. New Plant Breeding Techniques make it possible to create bio-factories out of tobacco plants, which will produce medical, pharmaceutical and cosmetic products.
Biofaction illustrated with a film, how our project MycoSynVac aims to create a vaccine for cattle in agroindustry, using genetic engineering. The film deals with the challenging context of vaccines, genetic engineering and industrial meat production by switching perspectives and tells the story of vaccine development from the viewpoint of a pathogen and other non human stakeholders such as a cow, a bacterium or antibodies.
Traditionally, bacterial vaccines are made from simply inactivated or attenuated pathogens, which are deployed to ‘train’ the immune system of the host. In many Mycoplasma species, however, these vaccines don’t work very well. MycoSynVac (funded by the European H2020 project) aims to develop novel types of vaccines to fight mycoplasma infections in farm animals. Its goal vaccine is not just a mere attenuated pathogen, but a reprogrammed organism that has to be, so to speak, ‘semi-infectious.’
Here is another example of our work, a short animated film we have done for the scientific project SYNMOD, that searches for novel synthetic antibiotics. “Lame antibiotics are in fear of the superbug. How will we react in the face of the microbial superwarriors? Will the bugs take over or will we come up with novel antibiotics not found in nature? The SYNMOD Research Team has taken up this challenge. Their mission is complicated, but impossible is nothing…“