The increasing cost of fossil fuels coupled with escalating environmental concerns have steered research towards safer and much cheaper biological alternatives. Synthetic biology has the potential to help in various ways by creating economical and renewable biofuels. The ease in which we are able to alter and genetically engineer organisms allows for better efficiency and optimization of an organism’s energy.

The Air Force, being interested in fuel technology, powers university researchers to provide innovative materials necessary to support the needs of the warfighter. The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) has many connections with researchers that they could collaborate with, but, in order to ensure a collaboration with the best and brightest scientists in the field, the Wright Brothers Institute (WBI) IDEA lab reached out to PreScouter to leverage their Global Scholar Network of PhD trained researchers.

WBI’s IDEA lab had an invitation-only open innovation challenge to move biosynthetic research towards manufacturable materials in order to provide the Air Force with state-of-the-art research opportunities. PreScouter identified and selected researchers for the open innovation challenge and invited them to submit research proposals. The best proposal of novel materials received a $50K prize. The IDEA lab is now working on collaborating with the winners of the challenge and internal teams to build out the concepts, based on PreScouter’s recommendations.

Learn more about PreScouter’s network at www.prescouter.com.

Source: http://wbi-icc.com/wp-content/uploads/newsletters/WBI_Newsletter_Jan-Feb_2015.pdf