Biotechnology offers solutions to some of humanity's most pressing challenges across multiple sectors. As an example, one recent innovation in the field holds the potential to make food production significantly more sustainable. U.S.-based biotech company Pivot Bio has developed a groundbreaking method to replace synthetic nitrogen fertilizers with microbe-based solutions.
Nitrogen plays a vital role for all life on Earth, being an essential building block for plants. In the early 20th century, when the challenge was how to grow enough food for a rapidly increasing population, nitrogen fertilizers became a cornerstone of modern agriculture. The revolutionary Haber-Bosch process enabled the fixation of atmospheric nitrogen synthetically, allowing fertilizer production to scale up industrially. While this innovation greatly boosted agricultural productivity, it has also contributed to significant environmental issues such as greenhouse gas emissions and waterway pollution.
A Natural Solution: Microbes
Although synthetic fertilizers were a scientific breakthrough, nature has had its own nitrogen-fixation solution for hundreds of millions of years. Certain microbes, particularly specific bacteria, can bind atmospheric nitrogen and convert it into ammonia, which plants can use directly. This biological nitrogen fixation is a completely natural process.
Pivot Bio has harnessed nitrogen-converting microbes to create a sustainable alternative to synthetic nitrogen fertilizers. These engineered microbes live symbiotically in the root systems of crops, binding atmospheric nitrogen and directly producing the ammonia plants need. Pivot Bio has optimized these naturally occurring microbes to continue producing ammonia even in soil with high nitrate levels from synthetic fertilizers, which would typically inhibit their activity. This allows plants to obtain the nitrogen they need without the downsides of synthetic fertilizers. In practice, farmers can plant these modified microbes alongside seeds, enabling the microbes to grow with the crops and produce nitrogen for as long as the plant lives. Microbes deliver nitrogen directly to the root system, preventing it from leaching or evaporating.
A Sustainable Future with Microbes?
Harnessing microbes in agriculture could be a major step toward more sustainable food production. This approach reduces the need for synthetic fertilizers, decreases agriculture's carbon footprint, and lessens the strain on water systems.
Currently, Pivot Bio’s genetically modified microbes are not sold in the EU due to strict regulations on genetically modified organisms (GMOs). There is also significant public opposition to GMOs across Europe, influencing political decisions to maintain stringent restrictions on their use.