CIB 2023 Session 1: Scale-Down to Scale-Up & Advancements in Enabling Technologies

Scale-down to Scale-up and advancement in enabling technologies: Industrial biotechnology needs to accelerate our ability to consistently move processes and products to market.  This session explores new approaches to glean critical parameters at the quickest and smallest scale while still identifying critical barriers to full scale operation early in the deployment process. Enabling technologies in biology, automation and information support this essential acceleration in the move to production.

Read more about this session's speakers below:

Scale-down to Scale-Up & Advancements in Enabling Technologies

3:15-3:45PM: "Re-inventing the vitamin A production process. One step towards a sustainable future."

Bouke Wim de Jong, Principal Scientist, DSM-Firmenich

DSM-Firmenich is an innovator in nutrition, health and beauty with over 150 years of research experience. Vitamins are a key product for the company and this year the 70th birthday of Vitamin A production was celebrated. Investing in a new fully bio-based production method, we're creating a whole new standard for sustainability reducing the carbon footprint by 80%. Here we will discuss lessons learned for developing, scaling and de-risking this re-invented production process.

3:45-4:15 PM: "Prof. Robert C. Leachman"

Prof. Robert C. Leachman, Professor of Industrial Engineering and Operations Research, UC Berkeley

The fastest way to improve an entire industry is to conduct benchmarking of the industry: Measure product development performance at many companies; identify the practices – technical, managerial, organizational – that underlie top performance; and publish the metric scores and practices so that all companies become aware of the most effective practices. BioMADE has funded the University of California at Berkeley to benchmark product development performance at BioMADE member companies. Standard metrics have been developed by the Berkeley researchers to gauge process variation, repeatability and stability for high-throughput screening, fermentation, downstream process development and assays of standard materials, as well as for the HTS-to-fermentation prediction performance. Participating BioMADE companies donate in-kind labor to record the data needed for computing the metrics and to host site visits by the Berkeley researchers to understand their underlying practices. This project is in its early stages, so this talk will describe the metrics of product development performance.

4:15-4:45 PM: "Integration of Benchtop NMR as a PAT Tool for Optimizing Bioprocess Monitoring"

 Herb Ryan,  Head of Fermentation Automation, Gingko

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) is a powerful quantitative analytical chemistry technique that has many applications across the life sciences. Traditionally used for structure elucidation and verification in the discovery process, NMR has been migrating to the development and manufacturing spaces due to its strength in bioprocess characterization and quantification.  The advent of benchtop NMR has only accelerated this trend and opened up new opportunities in automated bioprocess control when combined with predictive modeling and digital twin capabilities.  This talk will focus on how NMR can be implemented in fermentation monitoring and control.

4:45-5:15 PM: "A systematic approach to consistently scale large volume biomanufacturing processes"

Nelson R. Barton, Chief Technology Officer, Geno

Geno is accelerating the world's transformation to sustainable materials by replacing fossil fuel sources with plants. Geno believes that all products should be responsibly sourced, traceable, and transparent — the sustainable source™. Geno’s technology platform has been optimized for the development of sustainable, plant-based, large-scale, high yield biomanufacturing processes for drop-in chemicals that can compete with current petrochemical processes. Geno has commercialized multiple biomanufacturing processes, including Geno BDO™, a process for 1,4-butanediol which has one licensee operating at 30kTa and another set to bring on an additional 65kTa soon. In addition, Geno has a pipeline of processes in various stages of pilot and demo scale operation. In all, Geno has successfully scaled 6 different biomanufacturing processes from lab to multi-ton scale. In this talk, we will discuss Geno’s systematic approach to developing reliable scale-down fermentation and process models and our approach to executing pilot, demo and commercial campaigns that mirror lab performance.

5:15-5:30 PM: Low Carbon Carbohydrates at Scale 

Neal Jakel, President, FluidQuip

Sponsored Talk: Fluid Quip Technologies is on a mission to build a sustainable bioeconomy. Decades of pioneering design, development, and technological breakthroughs in Agri-Tech engineering have laid the groundwork for what’s next.

5:30- 5:45 PM: "Using cell-free systems to enable the production of conjugate vaccines"

Derek Anthony Wong, Stanford University

Conjugate vaccines are an effective method of preventing bacterial infections. However, current biomanufacturing processes rely on large, centralized facilities that are expensive and time intensive to build. Cell-free systems, which utilize cell lysates as opposed to living cells to produce proteins, provide an alternative approach that is distributable, modular, flexible, and scalable. This talk will focus on how cell-free systems can be used both as a prototyping tool for enzyme screening as well as an integrated manufacturing system for point-of-care production of conjugate vaccines.