The National Corn-to-Ethanol Research Center at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (NCERC at SIUE) hosted its first-ever virtual Annual Stakeholders meeting this month.

SIU System President Dan Mahony and SIUE Chancellor Randy Pembrook welcomed NCERC stakeholders before NCERC Executive Director John Caupert kicked off the meeting.

Following state and federal government updates, NCERC's Fiscal Year Points of Pride, and Financials, stakeholders had the opportunity to participate in two discussions regarding the future of NCERC.

The first discussion topic, "State and Federal Legislative Issues Influencing NCERC Stakeholders" was led by NCERC Policy and Business Development Specialist Aimee Dillenberger. This discussion was followed by another topic led by Gary Most, Marketicity. The discussion, "Attracting Industrial Research Clients During a COVID and post-COVID Economy," focused on how NCERC can better attract small start-up companies and larger, more established companies to its client base.

"In summary, FY20 can best be described as one we'll never forget," said Caupert. "In FY20, we learned more perhaps about ourselves and humanity than we did the technologies we assisted in commercializing. NCERC looks forward to a strong FY21."

Following the Stakeholders Meeting, NCERC also released its FY20 issue of NCERC Review, a document that showcases a month-by-month report of NCERC's activity during the Fiscal Year. Click the image below to take a look at this fiscal year's NCERC Review!

The NCERC has launched a new initiative focused on developing its own employees’ knowledge of the biofuels industry.

The new initiative, dubbed ‘Future Leaders,’ is a group consisting of Scientific Analysts Rachel Carpio and Kaitlin Lasseigne, Operations Manager Jared Burns, Assistant Research Engineer Kyle Sonderman, Policy and Business Development Specialist Aimee Dillenberger, Research Fellow Brad Smith and Communications and Outreach Specialist Claire Weinzierl.

The Future Leaders have been tasked with three projects to complete in the coming months including a corn ethanol trial, redesigning the NCERC display case in the lobby, and developing an Ethanol 101 presentation for future training purposes. The three projects are expected to be completely led and performed by the group, with only occasional guidance by supervisors when needed.

The Future Leaders recently conducted their corn ethanol trial using the 150-liter fermenter in the Fermentation Suite. The objective of the project was to ferment 100 liters of #2 corn mash in order to train the Future Leaders team members.

"Being a part of Future Leaders has me excited for the future of ethanol and other biorenewables. I am excited to learn even more about the ethanol industry and how we can work together toward a more sustainable future," said Dillenberger.

Read more about the Future Leaders initiative here.

NCERC Research Director Dr. Yan Zhang was invited to be an Executive Editor of the peer reviewed journal, Biotechnology Letters. The journal was launched in 1979 by Springer.

As an Executive Editor, Zhang will lead the Biofuels and Environmental Biotechnology section where her responsibilities will include reviewing manuscripts, helping the journal attract high-quality manuscripts, submitting her own research and writing occasional reviews and commentaries, suggesting topics and authors for commissioned reviews and commentaries, and providing feedback and suggesting improvements for the journal.

"I started my research in corn-based ethanol production, and it has developed as NCERC grew in the past years tackling various bioproduction scale-up," said Zhang. "I am delighted to be able to utilize what I have learned at NCERC and help an international journal in biotechnology. I see my experience with Biotechnology Letters as a win-win opportunity - while we are learning more from the journal and its network, we are bringing the experience and wisdom from NCERC and our industry to the international community of biofuel and biotechnology."

This month, NCERC was fortunate to host both Congressman Rodney Davis (IL-13) and Congressman Mike Bost (IL-12) while they were visiting the area for another event.

Both Congressmen were able to witness our "Future Leaders of Future Fuels" corn ethanol trial during its distillation process.

We would like to thank both Rep. Bost and Rep. Davis for stopping in to see our exciting research and for their constant support of NCERC and its initiatives!

NCERC Fermentation Scientist Dr. Jie Dong is serving as the Co-Principal Investigator (PI) with Dr. Noppadon Sathitsuksanoh of the University of Louisville to submit a grant proposal to the U.S. Department of Agriculture for the amount of $100,000 for SIUE. The proposal is titled "Production of polyhydroxyalkanoate bioplastics from softwood lignin: A circular economy of integrated chemical and biological transformations."

The NCERC is working to submit two concept papers to the U.S. Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy (ARPA-E). Dong is serving as the Co-PI with Dr. Steve Singer of the Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI). Together, NCERC and JBEI will submit their paper "Carbon-efficient Production of Energy Dense Molecules."

Dong is also serving as the Co-PI with Dr. Shang-Tian Yan of The Ohio State University to submit their paper "Maximizing CO2 efficiency by Clostridium strains."

This month, the NCERC welcomed a new Graduate Student from the SIUE Department of Chemistry, Alyssa Goff. Under the direction of NCERC Fermentation Scientist and Assistant Professor of Chemistry Dr. Jie Dong, Goff will lead the research study on converting industrial hemp biomass into biofuel and bioproducts.

This month, NCERC bid farewell to its Communications and Outreach Specialist Claire Weinzierl as she completed her last day on October 21.

Weinzierl recently accepted the position of Communications Manager at the Illinois Soybean Association in Bloomington, IL. In her new position, she will use her talents and communication skills to amplify the voices of soybean farmers here in Illinois.

"Having accepted her new position at Illinois Soybean Association, I reluctantly accepted the resignation of Claire Weinzierl, Communications and Outreach Specialist," said NCERC Executive Director John Caupert. "I only say 'reluctantly' because we will miss Claire and her skills very much.

"Claire accomplished great things during her tenure at NCERC. In addition to putting us on the media map through her press releases, Claire managed our social media through the scope of marketing and promotions. Claire transformed our social media into a public relations, promotions and marketing tool. Claire also managed the reconstruction of the ethanolresearch.com website. What was for years a tired, old website, is now fresh and current.

"Claire successfully made communications a strategic part of NCERC client relations. Through our NCERC at Work monthly newsletter, Claire expanded the reach of NCERC in ways never imagined. Today, NCERC at Work receives thousands of touches on a monthly basis. NCERC at Work was complemented by a weekly newsletter, Weekly Industry Brief. This internal newsletter was a method by which every NCERC employee was able to stay current on markets, policy initiatives and other events impacting the biorenewables industry.

"To say we're going to miss Claire and her unique capabilities is an understatement. We wish Claire the very best of luck with Illinois Soybean Association, where we know she is going to accomplish great things."

Weinzierl will begin her new role at ISA at the end of the month.

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October 6, 13, 20, 27, 2020

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October 13, 2020

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October 19, 2020

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October 19, 2020

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October 24, 2020

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October 27, 2020

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