Tomatoes & fuel-efficient tyres: SRI announces another breakthrough

Sumitomo Rubber Industries (SRI), manufacturer of the Falken tyre brand as well as Dunlop tyres for many markets outside Europe, reports a breakthrough that will “accelerate the development of the ultimate fuel-efficient tyres.” This breakthrough involves tomatoes.

Specifically, modified tomato enzymes that will improve the qualities of natural rubber. Together with professors and associate professors from three Japanese universities, SRI recently discovered that the use of modified tomato enzymes (developed as part of the team’s prior research) as a polymerisation catalyst makes it possible to select the initial monomer in a polymer at will. “Based on this discovery, we have now succeeded in synthesising biopolymers incorporating initial monomers that are more conducive to improving tyre performance,” shares SRI.

The research team had previously synthesised a biopolymer that isn’t found anywhere in nature. It did so by first identifying the segment of natural rubber synthase that plays a key role in determining polymer chain lengths. It then replaced this segment with a similar segment of specially modified enzyme derived from tomatoes.

“Having since furthered our research on modified tomato enzymes, we recently discovered that the use of modified tomato enzymes weakens initial monomer selectivity, which in turn allows for synthesis starting from monomers other than the initial monomers typically involved in the initiation of polymerisation,” SRI elaborates. “In addition, by taking advantage of this newfound characteristic, we have now succeeded in synthesising entirely new biopolymers incorporating initial monomers that we have selected at will.”

The aim of this joint work with Associate Professor Seiji Takahashi of Tohoku University, Associate Professor Satoshi Yamashita of Kanazawa University and Professor Yuzuru Tozawa of Saitama University is for SRI to develop tyres that “take fuel efficiency to all-new heights for the 2040s and beyond.”