Media Cleaning Could Help Biopharma Cut Costs and Fully Embrace Perfusion
A novel media cleaning process could help drug companies significantly reduce production costs, according to MIT researchers, who say the approach could improve the economic case for perfusion bioreactors and continuous manufacturing processes. The post Media Cleaning Could Help Biopharma Cut Costs and Fully Embrace Perfusion appeared first on GEN - Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News .
A groundbreaking "electrokinetic cleaning" technique could help pharmaceutical manufacturers recycle more culture media, potentially making perfusion-based processes more cost-effective, according to researchers. Perfusion bioreactors have long been used in the development lab, yet few have been adopted at a commercial scale, primarily due to concerns about media costs, says MIT postdoctoral associate Eric Wynne.
The novel recycling approach, outlined in a recent study, employs an electric field to separate cellular debris, reagents, and contaminants from culture media, yielding a "harvest stream" of uncharged molecules—primarily nutrients—and a "waste stream" with higher concentrations of charged molecules like ammonia and lactate. This process, which differs from earlier recycling attempts, enables the recovery of a larger proportion of spent media—up to 87.5% in tests—allowing manufacturers to reuse it in subsequent cultivation.
The researchers believe that recycling media in this manner could both increase the volume reused and reduce its impact on cell growth and productivity. Although the technology is still in the pilot phase, the cost-saving potential is substantial, particularly when combined with hybrid and continuous-mode manufacturing processes.
However, before widespread adoption, further development is required, particularly in understanding the impact of media recycling on product quality. The technology may be most suited for fully continuous mAb production processes with downstream continuous chromatography.
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