C56, which is a spinoff from the biotech firm Lucigen, is developing enzymes that can make ethanol production more efficient, whether corn-based ethanol or the next-generation version known as cellulosic ethanol.
The firm is one of the corporate partners collaborating with University of Wisconsin-Madison, which recently won $145 million in funding over three years to become one of three national biofuels research centers in the nation. The others are in California and Tennessee.