Grand Challenges in Biocatalysis

Abstract

Biocatalysis Is an Enabling Technology for Chemical Synthesis Biocatalysis comprises the use of nature’s catalytic repertoire to facilitate chemical reactions (Sheldon and Woodley 2018; Sheldon and Brady 2019). Enzymes catalyze a broad range of chemical transformations, generally under very mild reaction conditions and with high selectivity. These features make enzymes attractive catalysts for industrial chemical transformations, enabling less resource-consuming and waste-generating synthesis routes. Therefore, biocatalysis is already today an important pillar of chemistry and continues gaining relevance in academic research and in industrial application. The last two decades have seen an exponential expansion of biocatalytic tools ranging from new catalysts with tailored properties to new reaction engineering concepts. As a result, the relevance of biocatalysis in the chemical industry has been also increasing steadily. Today’s grand challenge in biocatalysis is to keep this impetus up and further consolidate and expand the toolbox of biocatalysis. A few aspects will be highlighted in the following: