Effective Removal of Bleachable Stains in Wash

OVERVIEW

The Seeker for this Wazoku Crowd Challenge is seeking to identify novel technologies that can effectively remove various categories of bleachable stains.

Stains are an everyday challenge in households, and while many are easily managed by common detergents, certain bleachable stains remain particularly difficult to remove. Traditionally, oxygen-based bleaching agents are used in solid laundry formulations. However, liquid detergents, especially biodegradable ones, have a limited range of bleaching agents due to stability issues. The Seeker is inviting innovative solutions that address these challenges by focusing on sustainable and biodegradable alternatives for bleachable food stains.

This Prize Challenge encourages Solvers to submit proposals for solutions, formulations, methods, or technologies that effectively remove bleachable stains, are compatible with in-wash laundry applications, and are sustainable and biodegradable.

Your IP Rights are protected in this Prize Challenge, the Seeker must award you to obtain them.

The best solution has the opportunity to win the award of $20,000 for meeting all must have solution requirements. The Challenge requires a written proposal to be submitted and Awards will be contingent upon the theoretical evaluation of the proposal by the Seeker against the Solution Requirements. To receive an Award, Solvers are required to grant non-exclusive rights to the Intellectual Property (IP) in their proposed solution. There is no assignment of IP Rights with this challenge. Solvers will retain all rights to any proposal not Awarded.

The Option: Awarded Solvers have a further option to agree to grant the Seeker an exclusive 90 day option to acquire ownership with respect to all intellectual property rights in their proposal with the commitment by the Seeker to pay a consideration for the transfer of the ownership equal to $10,000. This one-time payment is in addition to the aforementioned award for non-exclusive rights.

Submissions to this Challenge must be received by 11:59 PM (US Eastern Time) on November 11, 2024.

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THE CHALLENGE

Background

Households around the world encounter a wide variety of stains on their clothing and laundry, caused by a range of spills from food, oils, drinks, and beyond. Many stains are removed with standard, consumer-available products and laundry detergents.

While there are many ways to categorize these typical laundry stains, one way to classify them is by detergent ingredient (what can address the stain). Generally, stains are differentiated between:

• Surfactant stains – can be cleaned by surfactants, and are mainly fatty and oily stains. For example: cooking oil, frying fat.
• Enzymatic stains – can be removed by enzyme-based formulations, and are mainly protein-based or carbohydrate-based stains. For example: blood, porridge.
• Bleachable stains – can be removed with bleach or bleaching agents added to a detergent formulation under the right conditions. For example: berries, wine.

Cleaning bleachable stains can be challenging depending on the type of detergent or ingredients used. Some bleachable stains – such as those caused by berries, wine, and coffee – are notoriously difficult to remove from clothing. The Seeker is particularly interested in the following subcategories of bleachable food stains:

1. Anthocyan, tannin, and polyphenol-based stains: berries, red wine, tea, coffee, chocolate, curry, curcuma
2. Apocarotene and carotene-based stains: roots, leaves, algae, carrot, and citrus peel/juice
3. Capsanthin and capsorubin-based stains: capsicum, paprika, and pepperoni
4. Lycopene-based stains: tomato, ketchup, and tomato sauce

Oxygen-based bleaches are the market standard for solid laundry compositions, but to-date there are few effective bleaching ingredients for liquid detergents. Further development for liquid formulations has been limited, due to the complex chemistry required to ensure stability and functionality when bleaching ingredients are combined with enzymes and other ingredients present in detergent formulations.

Bleaching ingredients for liquid detergents tend to be limited to certain complexing agents and polymers, and the potential ingredients list becomes smaller when you add in requirements for bio-based or biodegradable ingredients. These bio-based and biodegradable bleaching agents are stable under the required liquid detergent formulation conditions (a pH of 8+/- 0.4; stable e.g. in combination with enzymes) and can operate effectively in removing stains even at low wash temperatures (30°C/40°C).

To-date, known solutions for removing bleachable food stains in detergent applications include, but are not limited to: complexing agents such as sodium citrate, metal organic frameworks (MOFs), polyethyleneimine (PEI) polymers, and phtalimido-peracetic acid (PAP).

The Challenge

The Seeker is searching for innovative and sustainable solutions, capable of removing one or more of the above subcategories of bleachable food stains (anthocyan, tannin, and polyphenol-based; apocarotene and carotene-based; capsanthin and capsorubin-based; or lycopene-based stains) in wash.

The focus of this Challenge is on in-wash removal of bleachable stains – solutions that can be added to detergent formulations or added to the wash cycle to effectively remove a bleachable stain, without compromising the effectiveness of the wash.

The particular opportunity is on drop-in solutions/ingredients that could be added to liquid formulations of detergents – as the solid laundry compositions are well-known and more stable when removing bleachable stains. However, applicability for both solid and liquid formulations, promising technologies, or novel approaches are all of interest to the Seeker in this Challenge.

Your solution should also remain effective for both solid laundry detergent compositions (powders, tablets) and required liquid detergent formulation conditions (pH of 8 +/-0.4).

These solutions could be completely new, drawn from different areas, or based on existing approaches in the laundry sector. This solution should consist of a method, approach, ingredient, or formulation for removing bleachable food stains and must be compatible with common detergent ingredients (enzymes, surfactants, builders, and fragrances) and at low-temperature wash cycles (30°C/40°C) to ensure effective stain removal without compromising the wash. Note that, the solution has to work under a very diluted environment during the main washing cycle, wherein ~45 - 50 g detergent formulation is diluted by approx. 17 L water.

Solutions must be biodegradable in nature, to promote environmental sustainability, and should have the potential to be derived from renewable feedstocks.

Any solution must be feasible for development by the Seeker and then in use by consumers, meaning there is a need for cost-effectiveness. While there is no listed cost requirement to meet, Solvers should note where possible any cost implications of e.g. technological approaches; enzyme cost vs. traditional polymers.

Technologies and approaches from adjacent fields – textile, paper, pulp – are also of great interest to the Seeker.

SOLUTION REQUIREMENTS

The Seeker is primarily interested in solutions with the potential to meet the following requirements:

Must have:

1. Effective in removing one or more of the following bleachable food stains:
   • Anthocyan, tannin, and polyphenol-based stains: berries, red wine, tea, coffee, chocolate, curry, curcuma
   • Apocarotene and carotene-based stains: roots, leaves, algae, carrot, and citrus peel/juice
   • Capsanthin and capsorubin-based stains: capsicum, paprika, and pepperoni
   • Lycopene-based stains: tomato, ketchup, and tomato sauce
2. Minimum of proof of principle of your solution – either through detailed description of how your solution can remove the above bleachable stains, or backed up by references, literature, and scientific concepts.
3. Functional at low-temperature wash cycles (30°C/40°C)
4. Compatible with common ingredients in solid and liquid detergents, including enzymes, surfactants, builders, and fragrances
   • Your solution should not alter the performance of these ingredients.
   • Your solution’s effectiveness should not be altered by the presence of these ingredients.
5. Sustainability – solutions that are biodegradable in nature, in their formulation or ingredients, if providing information about chemical/biological/enzymatic approaches.
6. The proposed solution should provide the Seeker "freedom to practice” or be available for potential licensing, there should be no third party patents or patent applications preventing the use of the proposed solution in commercial applications.

Nice to have:

1. Ecotox – washing detergents have to meet stringent ecotox profiles, ecological & toxicological data as per OECD/EC test guidelines
2. Biodegradability – according to OECD 301/302 evaluation.
3. Proof of concept – data, evidence, or testing analysis of your solution’s applicability in removing the listed bleachable stains.
4. Solutions incorporating renewable feedstocks into their chemistry and ingredient formulation are of particular interest to the Seeker.
5. Detailed description of the cost of the solution, in the format of cost per kilogram ($/kg) or cost per ton ($/ton) would be given greater consideration by evaluators.

Things to Avoid:

The Seeker is not at present considering solutions that rely on reductive bleach (sulfites, dithionite), hydrogen peroxide, chlorine bleach, UV-bleach, ozone, plasma, or electro-bleach technologies.

Solutions with Technology Readiness Levels (TRLs) 3-9 are invited.

This Prize Challenge has the following features:

1. Your IP Rights are protected; the Seeker must award you to obtain them.
2. The best solution has the opportunity to win the award of $20,000 USD for meeting all must have solution requirements, as solely determined by the Seeker.
3. Awards will be contingent upon the theoretical evaluation of the proposal by the Seeker against the Solution Requirements.
4. To receive an Award, Solvers are required to grant non-exclusive rights to the Intellectual Property (IP) in their proposed solution. There is no assignment of IP Rights with this Challenge. Solvers will retain all rights to any proposal not Awarded.
5. The Solver shall specify in their submission whether the Solver wants to participate in “The Option” for an additional potential consideration, or not.

YOUR SUBMISSION

Please login and register your interest, to complete the submission form.

The submitted proposals must be written in English and can include:

1. Participation type – you will first be asked to inform us how you are participating in this challenge, as a Solver (Individual) or Solver (Organization).
2. Option Participation – please confirm if you are willing to participate in the further exclusive IP rights option for an additional potential award consideration.
3. Solution Level - the Technology Readiness Level (TRL) of your solution.
4. Problem & Opportunity - highlight the innovation in your approach to the Problem, its point of difference, and the specific advantages/benefits this brings (up to 500 words).
5. Solution Overview - detail the features of your solution and how they address the SOLUTION REQUIREMENTS (500 words, there is space to add more in the summary field, and attach supporting data, diagrams, etc).
6. Solution Feasibility – Supporting Information and Rationale, such as references and precedents, that will help the Seeker evaluate and validate the feasibility of the solution (up to 500 words).
7. Experience - Expertise, use cases and skills you or your organization have in relation to your proposed solution (up to 500 words).
8. Solution Risks - any risks you see with your solution and how you would plan for this (up to 500 words).
9. Timeline, capability and costs - describe what you think is required to deliver the solution, estimated time and cost (up to 500 words).
10. Online References - provide links to any publications, articles or press releases of relevance (up to 500 words).

Wazoku encourages the use by Solvers of AI approaches to help develop their submissions, though any produced solely with generative AI are not of interest.

Find out more about participation in Wazoku Crowd Challenges.

Submissions to this Challenge must be received by 11:59 PM (US Eastern Time) on November 11, 2024.

Late submissions will not be considered. 

Your submission will be evaluated by the evaluation team first reviewing the information and content you have submitted at the submission form, with attachments used as additional context to your form submission. Submissions relying solely on attachments will receive less attention from the evaluation team.

After the Challenge submission close date, the Seeker will complete the review process and make a decision with regards to the winning solution(s) according to the timeline in the Challenge header. All Solvers who submit a proposal will be notified about the status of their submissions.