A new biodegradable packing foam developed at UBC not only potentially addresses the world’s plastic pollution crisis but also serves as an equal and true partnership example of working with First Nations.
A new biodegradable packing foam developed at UBC not only potentially addresses the world’s plastic pollution crisis but also serves as an equal and true partnership example of working with First Nations.
The team came together to turn a timely research idea into reality while helping solve a critical community need at the same time: UBC researchers Dr. Feng Jiang and postdoctoral fellow Dr. Yeling Zhu, Reg Ogen and Joe Wong, president and CEO and vice president respectively of Wet’suwet’en First Nation’s Yinka Dene Economic Development Limited Partnership, and the office of the Chief Forester in the Ministry of Forests.
Dr. Jiang, an assistant professor in the UBC faculty of forestry and the Canada Research Chair in Sustainable Functional Biomaterials, started developing a “biofoam” many years ago both to find new uses for wood waste and reduce pollution from packaging foam.
Read More: University of British Columbia
UBC postdoctoral fellow Dr. Yeling Zhu shows samples of the biodegradable foam. (Photo Credit: Lou Bosshart/UBC)
