Use of Agro-Industrial Wastes and By-Products for a Sustainable Production of Eco-Friendly Surface Active Compounds

Dear Colleagues,

Surfactants are one of the most important classes of chemical compounds at industrial level. Due to their properties, they are key components in the formulation of numerous products for application in the food, pharmaceutical, textile, or oil and gas industries, as well as in agriculture and bioremediation. Furthermore, surfactants are widely used in our daily life, being present in household detergents, cosmetics, or personal care products. Nowadays, the vast majority of surfactants commercialized and used in the industry are synthetic (petroleum-based, obtained through chemical synthesis) or semi-synthetic (obtained through chemical synthesis using renewable building blocks), and due to their toxicity and low biodegradability, questions regarding their long term effect on the environment are a growing concern. In the recent years, increasing environmental awareness among consumers, together with safety concerns and new environmental legislation resulted in an increasing demand for more environmentally-friendly compounds, which is also applied to surfactants.

Considering their environmental-compatible properties, and the possibility of being produced from renewable resources, surface-active compounds of microbial origin (biosurfactants) have attracted considerable interest in the last years. Several biosurfactants have demonstrated a similar or better performance when compared to their synthetic counterparts, and some of them exhibit biological activities (antimicrobial, antiadhesive, antiviral, antitumor) that are not present in synthetics. Furthermore, the replacement of synthetic surfactants by biosurfactants can contribute to achieve the objectives of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, by reducing water pollution and minimizing the release of hazardous chemicals; through the development of alternative environmentally-friendly production processes; through the sustainable management and efficient use of natural resources; and by reducing the emission of greenhouse gases and mitigating climate change.

For those reasons, biosurfactants are promising molecules which market is expected to grow in the upcoming years. Nowadays, one of the main limitations of biosurfactants when compared to synthetic surfactants is their high production costs, which need to be considerably reduced in order to increase their potential applications. Despite this, some biosurfactants are already incorporated in cosmetics, fungicides for use in agriculture, and cleaning products, although with limited market distribution. In this regard, the use of agro-industrial wastes and by-products as alternative substrates for their production has attracted considerable interest. This strategy can contribute to reduce the biosurfactants market price, besides promoting the development of the circular bio-economy and reducing the use of non-renewable resources. Some of those substrates (e.g. molasses, wastewaters obtained from different agro-industrial processes, fruit and vegetable wastes, lignocellulosic waste) demonstrated to be suitable for biosurfactants production, alone or in combination with other nutrients, due to their content in carbon and nitrogen sources, vitamins, and minerals.

This Special Issue is open to the submission of manuscripts focusing on biosurfactants production using different agro-industrial wastes and by-products; chemical and functional characterization of biosurfactants produced from agro-industrial wastes and by-products; study of potential applications of biosurfactants obtained from agro-industrial wastes and by-products; techno-economic analysis of biosurfactant production processes from agro-industrial wastes and by-products.

Dr. Eduardo Gudiña
Guest Editor

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• biosurfactant
• circular bio-economy
• corn steep liquor
• detergents
• foaming
• molasses
• olive mill wastewater
• rhamnolipids
• sophorolipids
• surfactin