AlkaEx –Technical and legal feasibility assessment for the safe recovery of alkaloids from ergot via extraction

Challenges

Ergot is cereal rendered harmful by fungal infestation, which is laboriously separated in modern mills and then mostly incinerated. This leads to the loss of valuable, highly potent alkaloids; at the same time, costs arise and there are no established, safe, and legally compliant utilization pathways.

Objectives and project plan

AlkaEx develops a comprehensive, desk-based feasibility assessment of the safe recovery of alkaloids from ergot. This includes a systematic safety and risk analysis, a detailed review of the regulatory framework, and an extensive literature and patent search on extraction and pretreatment methods (with a focus on scalable, preferably “green” concepts). On this basis, robust process concepts are developed, evaluated, and prioritized, and complemented by a market and application potential analysis. The unique selling proposition lies in the integration of safety engineering, regulatory compliance, process concept design, and market analysis, leveraging Fraunhofer CBP’s piloting and analytics expertise.

Impact

The study provides a solid decision basis and roadmap for follow-up projects (lab/pilot) to transform a currently discarded side stream into a value-adding feedstock pathway. Potential applications include supplying alkaloid mixtures as starting materials for pharmaceutical and medical device development as well as R&D; at the same time, the project strengthens regional value chains and the bioeconomy through new, sustainable valorization options.