Modern Approaches to Classification of Biotechnology as a Part of NBIC-Technologies for Bioeconomy

Aims: The aim of the article is to systematize and improve existing theoretical approaches to the classification of biotechnology as a part of NBIC-technologies for bioeconomy.

Study Design: The reviews were carried out in the period 2005–15 on the basis of studying the world countries biotechnologies development trends as well as on the basis of the research results obtained by World and Ukrainian institutions and universities.

Place and Duration of Study: Department of International Economic Relations and Tourism Business of VN Karazin Kharkiv National University conducted the research between January 2016 and June 2016.

Methodology: Content analysis and bibliographic retrieval have been used as the main methods of research, which allowed making a meaningful analysis of classic papers and works of modern economists-practitioners devoted to the Global and Ukrainian trends in biotechnologies’ scientific research as a part of NBIC-technologies for bioeconomy.

Results: The article demonstrates that currently there is no common and unified classification of biotechnology. The authors systematized existing approaches to biotech typology by a wide range of criteria (objects, the level of human impact to biological systems, technologies, colours, and area of application) and proposed to improve them. The authors analyzed the “colour” classification, found its inconsistencies and disadvantages (e.g. separation of “white” biotechnology from “grey” one or expediency of “violet” biotechnology in this classification). With the help of the input-output matrix the authors expanded the scope of relationships between different biotech fields by supplementing new biotech application examples at the intersections of branches, adding extra fields (“brown”, “black”, “gold”, and “violet”) and particular cases of their interactions, namely, they: expanded the scope of application as to biomedicine, explained the role of biomedicine for development of bioterrorism as a feedstock supplier, defined the impact of biopharmaceutics on food industry and bioterrorism by means of concrete examples, considered industrial biotechnology as a platform for biomedicine development and supporting force for such a negative endeavor as bioterrorism, characterized the role of agricultural biotechnology in biopharmaceutics enhancement, added examples of interaction between arid zones and desert biotechnology on the one hand and food industry/ biopharmaceutics on the other hand, identified the area of arid zones and desert biotechnology application, included potential application of scientific results for enhancement of industrial biotechnology. Moreover, the authors developed the hierarchical model that reflects the ties between platform technologies (regenerative technologies, genetic engineering, synthetic biology, etc.), biotechnologies, and bioeconomy as a new type of economy based on biotechnology commercialization.

Conclusion: The authors developed the hierarchical model that reflects the relationships between platform technologies (regenerative technologies, genetic engineering, synthetic biology, etc.), biotechnologies, and bioeconomy as a new type of economy based on biotechnology commercialization. The enhanced version of the input-output matrix “origin - application” is a perspective pattern to be supplemented with the progress of global biotechnology industry, because it includes all the biotech branches that currently are more or less represented in the world. In addition, the model can be transformed and adapted for biotech industry of any country by reducing or splitting of the branches.