Overview

Although Nodule Factory is still in the stage of laboratory, we believe that it can play an important role in agriculture. “It's not enough to just finish the experiments and get results; we also need to clarify what our product is, how to use it, and what supporting facilities are needed. Otherwise, even if the product is excellent, it will be meaningless if farmers can't use it,” said Francina Lerato Kuwali, an agricultural technician at China-Africa Science and Technology Backyards, from whom we learnt about the local legume farming, economy, and nutrition situation in Malawi.

Therefore, we actively engages with the global community, dedicated to thinking about how to truly bring our project to helping the world.

Furthermore, during our interview with Xiaoqiang Jiao, a professor of agricultural resources and environment, we learned that soybean oil is the mainly soybean product in Africa. When we asked whether the profits would be higher if products such as soybean ice cream could be produced, Prof. Jiao agreed that they would be but unfortunately, the current processing industry chain in Africa only supports the production of soybean oil and soybean milk. Therefore, based on the project we plan a comprehensive industry chain and Prof. Jiao confirmed our idea.

Thus, our Implementation page presents our expectations on the downstream applications of Nodule Factory, as shown in the following figure.

Generally, we hope to make our Nodule Factory into a whole Nodule Factory Industry Chain, which includes two main parts-S. fredii inoculants and Bean products.

Long-term application of chemical fertilizers to soil can lead to the accumulation of certain fertilizers, resulting in a gradual decline in beneficial microorganisms. It also causes a reduction in soil organics and a decrease in the fertility of cultivated land. As a type of microbial fertilizer, rhizobia inoculants can improve crop root growth and the soil microenvironment through rhizobia, promoting the formation of root nodules in symbiotic relationships with leguminous plants. If we use rhizobia inoculants and apply fertilizers scientifically and reasonably, the nitrogen-fixation ability of rhizobia can be supported, leading to an increase in yields. It also helps improve the quality of soybeans and enhance soil fertility. However, through our interviews with Prof. Tian and Jinbiao Hu (see iHP for more details), we learn that despite policy advocacy, rhizobia inoculants are not widely used. Therefore, we use our genetically modified rhizobium, S. fredii, to develop a new type of product-S. fredii inoculants, producing EPA and DHA while fertilizing the field.

The cultivation of leguminous plant is very extensive, and soy foods are ubiquitous in our daily life. Our project ultimately aims to transport DHA and EPA produced in root nodules into soybeans. In our vision, we can finally get a kind of soybeans rich in nutrition. There are many kinds of leguminous plants. So, if our S. fredii inoculants could be applied while planting legumes, the added value of beans and bean products will be greatly increased. Moreover, through our communication with Hongli Yuan, we got to know about the "one more step" model (see iHP for more details), which was a inspiration for promotion of bean products.

Below, we will look at these three aspects in more details to gain insight into how to successfully achieve this goal.

Nodule Factory Industry Chain

We plan to create a brand-new agricultural production-health product industry chain, which moves our project of Nodule Factory from laboratory to reality. Thus, we write a Nodule Factory Industry Chain Plan, which is shown below.

S. fredii Inoculants

The following are the expected rendering and information manual of our S. fredii inoculants product:

Considering the existing problem that farmers tend not to use rhizobia inoculants, we learned the system of “leading farmers” to promote our product to farmers through our interview with Xiaoqiang Jiao (see iHP for more details). The specific process is also explained in the Nodule Factory Industry Chain Plan above.

Bean Products

Bean products refer to processed food made from soybeans, small beans, green beans, peas, broad beans, and other beans as the main raw materials. In order to explore what kinds of beans can be the raw materials and what bean products can be made, we searched for types of beans and bean products, as shown in the table below.

Category	Details
Type of beans	soybeans, black beans, red beans, mung beans, broad beans, peas, lentils, four-pronged beans, white jade beans, chickpeas, vegetable beans, lentils, etc.
Condiments made from beans	soybean oil: important cooking oil soy sauce: made from soybeans or black beans bean paste: a common sauce fermented black soybean
Bean based dishes	soy milk, a fermented drink made from ground beans, green bean soup, tofu, Jellied bean curd, bean curd, bean sprouts, Soybean husk, thin sheets of bean curd, bean curd tendon, bean puffs, bean curd sticks, fermented bean curd, natto, soybean sausage
Bean snacks	vegetarian chicken, vegetarian ham, vegetarian meat (high protein, as plant-based meat), dried tofu, soybean sticks, soybean ice cream
Bean-based nutritional products	soy protein powder, soy lecithin, soy milk powder rich in EPA and DHA, protein powder rich in EPA and DHA, DHA formulated dog and cat food
Bean-based feed	soybean meal is the most widely used and most plant-based protein feed

So what will our bean products be? Let’s see from the perspective of a dog!

From the perspective of the dog, we can see that Bean products rich in DHA and EPA can be seen everywhere in people’s daily life. This is just our ultimate expectation! We hope that the bean products will be widely spread and be further presented in various forms of products, as shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3

Moreover, our bean products have their unique advantages:

• Beans full of EPA and DHA are more natural and additive-free, as well as less costly and more affordable than nutraceuticals specifically designed for EPA and DHA supplementation, such as fish oil and algal oil.
• Bean products are not plant-based genetically modified foods and compared to fish oil, they are very friendly to vegetarians and seafood allergy sufferers, making them more acceptable to most people.
• Compared to fish oil, soy foods are more diverse and inclusive in taste, style and flavor. Moreover, people have wider access to soy foods.
• The cultivation of legumes is very extensive, so soy foods are ubiquitous in life and can help people realize supplemental nutrition in their daily diets.
• People in poor areas can also meet the nutritional needs by planting soybeans, while the added value of soybean cultivation can also lead to local economic development.

Moreover, our bean products have their unique advantages:

• Beans full of EPA and DHA are more natural and additive-free, as well as less costly and more affordable than nutraceuticals specifically designed for EPA and DHA supplementation, such as fish oil and algal oil.
• Bean products are not plant-based genetically modified foods and compared to fish oil, they are very friendly to vegetarians and seafood allergy sufferers, making them more acceptable to most people.
• Compared to fish oil, soy foods are more diverse and inclusive in taste, style and flavor. Moreover, people have wider access to soy foods.
• The cultivation of legumes is very extensive, so soy foods are ubiquitous in life and can help people realize supplemental nutrition in their daily diets.
• People in poor areas can also meet the nutritional needs by planting soybeans, while the added value of soybean cultivation can also lead to local economic development.