Biobased Sciences Wageningen University and Research

Overview

This master zooms in on four main aspects to come to a sustainable transition: economic, technical, social and environmental aspects. The programme is interdisciplinary. It includes both biomass production, bioconversion, biorefinery and societal, logistic and economic transition processes.

The Biobased Sciences programme at the Wageningen University and Research is a two-year programme. In the first year you will start with two foundation courses: Principles of Biobased Economy and Circular Economy. These courses focus on important aspects when designing a biobased and/or circular economy. During this year you will also follow the course Academic Consultancy Training. You can choose the other courses in the first year yourself, partly within the specialisation of your choice.

Specialisations

There are three specialisations to choose from. You will develop thorough expertise in one of the three disciplines, and you will gain basic knowledge about the other two disciplines.

Focuses on the knowledge of plant physiology and development, genetics and breeding, and plant biotechnology for biomass production. Biomass can be produced in the field, in greenhouses, in the sea as well as in forests. Several social, environmental, economic and technical aspects will determine which crops are most suitable for which applications and how you can grow them in the best way.

Focuses on the processing steps needed to produce chemicals, biopolymers, feed or renewable energy from biomass. Engineering is fully integrated with process technology, physical-, organic- and biochemistry, product quality and process requirements. All those fields play an important role when designing a biorefinery.

This includes resource management, logistics, closing of energy, water and nutrient cycles, policy, biobased business and sustainability analysis methods.