By Oliver I. Strube, Biobased & Bioinspired Materials, Paderborn University, Germany. Striving for innovation and a growing awareness for environmental issues have increasingly promoted research that is summarised by buzzwords such as 'green', 'sustainable', 'bio ' etc. in recent decades. A wide understanding has developed that nature's approaches are often superior to artificial counterparts. In coatings technology, however, this 'bio-discussion' mostly centres around its most basic variant: renewable resources used as substitutes for petrochemical raw materials. Nature is seen as just providing another feedstock for chemicals ...