Department of Life Cycle Engineering GaBi, Institute for Acoustics and Building Physics IABP, University of Stuttgart, Stuttgart, Germany.
Department of Industrial Biotechnology, Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology IGB, Stuttgart, Germany.
Adv Biochem Eng Biotechnol. 2022;181:235-269. doi: 10.1007/10_2021_194.
Biosurfactants are considered as an environmentally friendly and sustainable alternative to conventional fossil-derived and chemically produced surfactants. Their production pathways, physicochemical properties, and applications are widely researched and discussed in literature. In this context, investigating the different impacts from the entire life cycle of biosurfactants is important to understand and mitigate potential environmental hotspots. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is an internationally accepted and standardized methodology to analyze the environmental impacts of products from a holistic view. Therefore, this study provides a detailed overview of existing LCA studies of biosurfactants by means of a systematic literature research. The focus specifically lies on articles that investigated microbial biosurfactants. However, the systematic approach used ensured a broader overview related to bio-based surfactants as well. Furthermore, two related topics, ecotoxicity and biodegradability of biosurfactants, were identified and discussed based on the search findings. After screening over 2,500 documents using Scopus and Google Scholar, six relevant LCA articles of biosurfactants could be identified. The identified articles are divided into LCA studies of alkyl polyglycosides, chemically produced bio-based surfactants, and LCA studies of microbial biosurfactants, their content analyzed and discussed in context. In conclusion, the number of available LCA studies is very limited and their results are often not comparable. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this review is the first of its kind to provide a detailed overview of LCA studies of biosurfactants. Consequently, the need for implementing more LCA studies becomes clear.
生物表面活性剂被认为是一种环保且可持续的替代传统石油衍生和化学合成表面活性剂的选择。它们的生产途径、物理化学性质和应用在文献中得到了广泛的研究和讨论。在这种情况下，研究生物表面活性剂整个生命周期的不同影响对于理解和减轻潜在的环境热点非常重要。生命周期评估 (LCA) 是一种国际上公认和标准化的方法，可从整体角度分析产品的环境影响。因此，本研究通过系统文献研究提供了生物表面活性剂现有 LCA 研究的详细概述。重点特别在于调查微生物生物表面活性剂的文章。然而，所使用的系统方法确保了与生物基表面活性剂相关的更广泛的概述。此外，根据搜索结果确定并讨论了两个相关主题，即生物表面活性剂的生态毒性和可生物降解性。使用 Scopus 和 Google Scholar 筛选了超过 2500 篇文献后，确定了 6 篇相关的生物表面活性剂 LCA 文章。确定的文章分为烷基多糖苷的 LCA 研究、化学合成的生物基表面活性剂的 LCA 研究以及微生物生物表面活性剂的 LCA 研究，对其内容进行了分析和讨论。总之，可用的 LCA 研究数量非常有限，其结果往往不可比。据作者所知，这是首次对生物表面活性剂的 LCA 研究进行详细概述的综述。因此，需要进行更多的 LCA 研究。
