1.4. Biotechnology

The objective is to lay the foundations for the European industry to stay at the front line of innovation, also in the medium and long term. It encompasses the development of emerging technology areas such as synthetic biology, bioinformatics and systems biology, as well as exploiting the convergence with other enabling technologies such as nanotechnology (e.g. bionanotechnology), ICT (e.g. bioelectronics) and engineering technology. These and other cutting-edge fields deserve appropriate measures in terms of research and development to facilitate effective transfer and implementation into new applications. The objective is twofold: on the one hand, enabling the European industry (e.g. chemical, health, mining, energy, pulp and paper, fibre-based products and wood, textile, starch, and food processing industries) to develop new products and processes meeting industrial and societal demands using preferably environmentally friendly and sustainable production methods and competitive and enhanced biotechnology-based alternatives to replace established ones; on the other hand, harnessing the potential of biotechnology for detecting, monitoring, preventing and removing pollution. It includes R&I on novel enzymes with optimised biocatalyst functions, enzymatic and metabolic pathways, industrial scale bio-process design, integration of bio-processes in industrial production processes, advanced fermentation, up- and down-stream processing, and gaining insight on the dynamics of microbial communities. It will also encompass the development of prototypes for assessing the techno-economic feasibility as well as the sustainability of the developed products and processes. The objective is to develop platform technologies (e.g. genomics, meta-genomics, proteomics, metabolomics, molecular tools, expression systems, phenotyping platforms and cell-based platforms) triggering leadership and competitive advantage on a wide number of economic sectors having econonomic impact. It includes aspects such as underpinning the development of bio-resources with optimised properties and applications beyond conventional alternatives; enabling exploration, understanding and exploitation in a sustainable manner of terrestrial and marine biodiversity for novel applications, bio-based products and processes; and sustaining the development of biotechnology-based healthcare solutions (e.g. diagnostics, biologicals, and bio-medical devices).

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Source: EUR-Lex (Cellar) · retrieved 2026-11-04 · Text as adopted (Official Journal); later amendments are not incorporated in this text.