Learn about Renewable, Low‑Impact Surfactants

What are Green Surfactants?

Green surfactants are environmentally friendly surface-active ingredients made from renewable, biobased sources. These differ from industry surfactants, which rely on using petrochemicals. Green surfactants deliver effective cleansing, foaming, and emulsifying performance while offering key sustainability benefits, including biodegradability, low toxicity, and reduced environmental persistence. Many of these, such as glycolipid biosurfactants, mimic natural structures, resulting in excellent skin compatibility and strong “clean beauty” credentials. As consumers and brands move away from sulfates, ethoxylates, and other synthetic surfactants, green surfactants offer a high-performance, eco-conscious alternative without compromising efficacy.

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GlycoSurf's Green Molecules

Eco-friendly!

GlycoSurf manufactures several different classes of sugar-based green surfactants including rhamnolipids, rhamnosides, and glucosides.

Explore our Green Surfactants

Green Surfactants are made entirely from renewable resources, and are commonly referred to as glycolipids. They are readily biodegradable and exhibit low-toxicity.
GlycoSurf’s green surfactants are made using a variety of carbohydrates (sugars) for the hydrophilic moiety, and a variety of natural fats and oils for the hydrophobic portion of the target molecule.
All of GlycoSurf’s starting materials for the production of our green surfactants are sourced from renewable resources.
GlycoSurf’s materials are currently available for purchase including: rhamnolipids, rhamnosides, and other glycolipid surfactants.

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What are surfactants?

Surfactants, in general, are molecules consisting of a hydrophilic (water-loving) part and a hydrophobic (water-hating) part. The combination of a hydrophilic head-group with a hydrophobic tail-group is what is collectively referred to as a surfactant. In general, there are only a few types of surfactants commercially available (anionic, non-Ionic, cationic, & amphoteric). Each of these types of surfactants can be further defined by their substrate type: synthetic or green (i.e. bio-based).

Surfactant Applications

Personal Care

Anti-aging Products
Acne Skin Creams
Body Wash
Hair Care

Agricultural

Food Emulsifiers
Crop Health (Adjuvants)
Soil Remediation

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Cleaning Agents

Medical Device Cleaning
Surface Cleaning
Oil Spill Clean-up

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High Tech Services

Metals Recovery
Soil Remediation
Enhanced Oil Recovery

GlycoSurf makes (rhamnolipid) bio-based, eco-friendly surfactants.

Synthetic surfactants are very well characterized materials and are considered commodity products. In fact, millions of tons of traditional synthetic surfactants are sold today worldwide, and the estimated market size is ~$73 billion annually worldwide.

Surfactants are utilized in many applications such as soaps, personal care, textiles, industry & institutional cleaning, elastomers & plastics, oilfield chemicals, agriculture, food emulsifiers, & many others.

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Common Questions

What is a Surfactant?

Surfactants can be broadly defined as molecules that consist of one hydrophilic portion and one hydrophobic portion. The majority of surfactants are made using petroleum ingredients, which is a non-renewable resource. Many of these traditional surfactants are experiencing a significant increase in regulatory scrutiny worldwide, due to their poor biodegradability and questionable toxicity profiles. Consequently, alternatives (known generically as Green Surfactants) to traditional surfactants are being developed worldwide as replacements in many applications.

What is a Rhamnolipid?

The formation of green surfactants simply refers to the source of the hydrophilic and hydrophobic groups. GlycoSurf focuses on producing green surfactants by using renewable sugar molecules (such as rhamnose, glucose, etc.) to serve as the hydrophilic head-group. GlycoSurf also employs natural oleochemical sources for the hydrophobic tail-group in our green surfactants. The increasing demand for eco-friendly surfactants(bio-based) , specifically from the European and North American regions, is driving the growth of the surfactants market in general. Regulations and non-toxicity requirements are among the main factors favoring the use of green surfactants in these regions.

Why Rhamnolipids?

Green Surfactants are in demand for a wide range of industrial applications as they increase solubility, foaming capacity and lower surface tensions. In particular, rhamnolipid has been used broadly in the cosmetic industry for products such as moisturizers, anti-aging creams, anti-acne skincare, and shampoos. Rhamnolipid is also efficacious in bioremediation of organic and heavy metal polluted sites.

What are Rhamnose-Based Green Surfactants?

Biosynthetic Rhamnose

Rhamnose sugar is a naturally occurring sugar that is generally classified as either a methyl-pentose or a 6-deoxy-hexose. Rhamnose is one of the few sugars found in nature in L-form, i.e. L-rhamnose. Rhamnose can be isolated from buckthorn (rhamnus), poison sumac, and plants in the genus Uncaria. Rhamnose is also produced by microalgae belonging to the Bacillariophyceae.

Unique Properties of Rhamnose

Rhamnose exhibits some very unique properties as a carbohydrate, for example rhamnose has been shown to have anti-inflammatory and skin soothing properties. The claim is that rhamnose has been clinically proven to improve skin rejuvenation at the source by improving collagen production, elastin production, and cellular turnover.

A Naturally Green Surfactant

Nature takes advantage of the unique properties of rhamnose through the production of green surfactants known as rhamnolipids from the bacteria Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Rhamnolipids are naturally occurring biosurfactants that contain L-rhamnose and β-hydroxydecanoic acid.

Challenges of Biosynthetic Rhamnolipids

There are however significant drawbacks to Nature’s method of producing rhamnose-based green surfactants. GlycoSurf employs a proprietary process for the synthetic production of a wide variety of rhamnose-based green surfactants that overcome many of the challenges of biosynthetic rhamnolipids. GlycoSurf’s synthetic rhamnose-based green surfactants offer many advantages compared to traditional biosynthetic rhamnose green surfactants. Since GlycoSurf does not rely on the use of bacteria to manufacture our rhamnose-based surfactants such as rhamnolipids and rhamnosides, our materials are lower cost, more scalable, and highly tailorable for specific applications.

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