Grant: Applied Research and Development Grants - Level 1

The clean-labeling trend in consumer products continues to grow. Not only are consumers willing to pay more for clean-labelled products, they are also expecting more from these products, such as health benefits,sustainable production and transparent sourcingMirexus Biotechnologies Inc. (MBI), is a leading bio-nanomaterials company based in Guelph, Ontario. MBIseeks to add new functional products to its line of plant-derived cosmetic and personal care ingredients. The new plant-derived products will be used as antimicrobial treatments, with a goal of displacing conventionalsynthetic preservatives.MBI proposes in collaboration with Lambton College to use sustainable extraction methods to isolateantimicrobial phytochemicals from abundant Ontario plant feedstocks, to improve antimicrobial efficacythrough encapsulation and to assess the ability of the phytochemicals and encapsulated phytochemicalformulations to prevent microbial contamination of cosmetic base creams.MBI will benefit from receiving the knowledge needed to commercialize new products, and as MBI intends tobe an active partner in this project, including training HQP on research techniques used in cosmeticsdevelopment, Lambton will benefit by achieving an increased capacity in this growing area thereby allowing usto better serve the broader personal care products, and other related, industries. Successful development of new antimicrobial products initiated during this project would directly add to MBI's bottom line. The majority of MBI's customers are overseas, and increased exports of new products to these markets supports Canada's GDP.