Description
In the research and development phase of industrial fermentation processes, typically a tremendous research effort is put into both optimisation of the strain and the process conditions. This is often done in microtiter plates or by using shake-flask cultures as they are easy to set up. However, only batch experiments are possible and conditions are not well-controlled. This might result in deviations from results that would be obtained in industrial scale reactors. Bench-scale reactor cultivations provide an alternative where conditions can be well-controlled and industrial conditions mimicked. However, this type of cultivations are rather labour intense and are therefore not a viable alternative when large number of strains or conditions should be screened. Microbioreactors offer the possibility to circumvent many of the above-mentioned problems: (1) Many parallel reactors allows for high-throughput screening; (2) The working volumes are very small, keeping costs low; (3) On-line measurements and control are possible (4) The reactors can be fabricated from polymers, thus making them disposable after use; (5) Finally, for batch type microbioreactors, the fermentation variables compare favourably with bench scale reactors, which indicates that the right culture physiology can be maintained at small vs. larger scale, making the technology commercially viable.Place: San Diego, CA, USA
Period | 8 Nov 2009 → 11 Nov 2009 |
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Held at | Unknown |