Try riding on eggshells and tomato skins.

• Position: Tire production

Tomorrow's tires could come from the farm as much as the factory. Researchers at Ohio State University, Wooster, have discovered that food waste can replace--at least partially--the petroleum-based filler that has been used in manufacturing tires for more than a century. In tests, rubber made with the new fillers exceeds industrial standards for performance, which ultimately may open up new applications for rubber.

As research scholar Katrina Cornish (endowed chair in biomaterials) explains it, the technology has the potential to solve three problems: it makes the manufacture of rubber products more sustainable; reduces U.S. dependence on foreign oil; and keeps waste out of landfills.

Cornish has spent years cultivating new domestic rubber sources, including a rubber-producing dandelion. Now she has a patent-pending method for turning eggshells and tomato peels into viable--and locally sourced--replacements for carbon black, a petroleum-based filler that American companies often purchase from overseas.

About 30% of a typical automobile tire is carbon black; it is the reason tires appear black. It makes the rubber durable, and its cost varies with petroleum prices, but carbon black is getting harder to come by. 'The tire industry is growing very quickly, and we don't just need more natural rubber; we need more filler, too. The number of tires being produced worldwide is going up all the time, so countries are using all the carbon black they can make. There's no longer a surplus; so we can't just buy some from Russia to make up the difference like we used to. At the same time, we need to have more sustainability."

That is why she and her team are getting eggshells and other food waste from food producers. "We're not suggesting that we collect the eggshells from your breakfast. We're going right to the biggest...