News

On 25 January, the radio Naba programme about mushrooms "Mycelium" hosted Ilze Irbe, a leading researcher and mushroom expert at the LSIWC Cellulose Laboratory. The theme of the programme "Mushrooms start and win" reflects Ilze's recent success in winning the main prize in the international competition "WorldStar for Packaging". The prize was awarded to the entry "Mycelium composite pellets for packaging material protection" - an environmentally friendly, compostable material composed of mushroom mycelium and wood or hemp residual fibres. Ilze talked about the role of fungi in her research...

The Latvian State Forest Research Institute “Silava,” the Latvian State Institute of Wood Chemistry (LSIWC), and the Latvian University of Life Sciences and Technologies (LBTU) have joined forces to implement the National Research Program (Nr. VPP-ZM-VRIIILA-2024/2- 0002) “Forest4LV – Innovation in Forest Management and Value Chain for Latvia's Growth: New Forest Services, Products and Technologies (Forest4LV). The goal of this program is to develop sustainable approaches to forest management in Latvia and create innovative solutions for wood processing technologies. During a project progress...

LTV1 "Rīta Panorama" published a story about one of the 2024 Most Significant Achievements in Latvian Science "First flight of the European Ariane-6 launcher with a cryogenic insulation material developed in Latvia", which is based on the research of the Polymer Laboratory of the LSIWC and conducted in cooperation with the German company Ariane Group. The story is about last summer's test flight of the European Space Agency's Ariane-6 launcher. Ariane-6 is a new type of launch vehicle and the thermal insulation of its hull was developed by LSIWC scientists, who have developed an efficient...

On 15 January 2025, JSC Latvijas Finieris, an industrial partner of the Latvian State Institute of Wood Chemistry, started construction of a new resin plant, an important milestone in the transition to a bio-based economy. The new plant will produce resins from the natural wood component lignin, which will partially replace the previously widely used fossil phenol, the basis for synthetic phenol-formaldehyde resins used to produce plywood for consumer products (construction, finishing and transport industries). A lignin processing plant of this scale is unique not only in Latvia, but also in...

The World Packaging Organisation announced the results of the international competition "WorldStar for Packaging" on 9 January, with the main prize going to Ilze Irbe, a leading researcher of the Cellulose Laboratory! Ilze entered the competition with her work "Mycelium composite pellets for the protection of packaged products". These pellets are a sustainable and environmentally friendly alternative to traditional packaging materials, made from fungi mycelium and hemp and/or wood residues. They are fully biodegradable and compostable, unlike synthetic foam packaging materials. In 2023, Ilze's...

On 11 January this year, on Radio SWH's programme "Mind Will Save the World", host Ieva Siliņa interviewed Laura Andže, a leading researcher at the Latvian State Institute of Wood Chemistry's Cellulose Laboratory, and Sergejs Gaidukovs, a tenure-track professor at Riga Technical University, about the use of wood and wood products. The programme focused on innovations made in Latvia from wood. Laura introduced the history of the use of wood, explained the chemical composition of wood, and talked about the various research activities carried out at LSIWC. Laura stressed that wood is Latvia's...