The Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) is a US Department of Energy Bioenergy Research Center that will address these roadblocks in biofuels production. JBEI draws on the expertise and capabilities of three national laboratories (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Sandia National Laboratories (SNL), and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL)), two leading US universities (University of California campuses at Berkeley (UCB) and Davis (UCD)), and a foundation (Carnegie Institute of Washington at Stanford University) to develop the scientific and technological base needed to convert the energy stored in cellulose into transportation fuels and commodity chemicals. Established scientists from the participating organizations are leading teams of researchers to solve the key scientific problems and develop the tools and infrastructure that will enable other researchers and companies to rapidly develop new biofuels and scale production to meet US transportation needs, and to develop and rapidly transition new technologies to the commercial sector.
JBEI’s biomass-to-biofuels research approach is based in three interrelated scientific divisions and a technologies division. The Feedstocks Division will develop improved plant energy crops to serve as the raw materials for biofuels. The Deconstruction Division will investigate the conversion of this lignocellulosic plant material to usable forms of sugar and aromatics. The Fuels Synthesis Division will create microbes that can efficiently convert sugar and aromatics into ethanol and other biofuels. JBEI’s cross-cutting Technologies Division will develop and optimize a set of enabling technologies—including high-throughput, chip-based and ‘omics platforms, tools for synthetic biology, multi-scale imaging facilities, and integrated data analysis—to support and integrate JBEI’s scientific program.
