Challenges in industrial fermentation technology research.
Industrial fermentation processes are increasingly popular, and are considered an important technological asset for reducing our dependence on chemicals and products produced from fossil fuels. However, despite their increasing popularity, fermentation processes have not yet reached the same maturity as traditional chemical processes, particularly when it comes to using engineering tools such as mathematical models and optimization techniques. This perspective starts with a brief overview of these engineering tools. However, the main focus is on a description of some of the most important engineering challenges: scaling up and scaling down fermentation processes, the influence of morphology on broth rheology and mass transfer, and establishing novel sensors to measure and control insightful process parameters. The greatest emphasis is on the challenges posed by filamentous fungi, because of their wide applications as cell factories and therefore their relevance in a White Biotechnology context. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is introduced as a promising tool that can be used to support the scaling up and scaling down of bioreactors, and for studying mixing and the potential occurrence of gradients in a tank.
Department of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering, Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Lyngby, Denmark.
Luca Riccardo
LR
Formenti
Anders
A
Nørregaard
Andrijana
A
Bolic
Daniela Quintanilla
DQ
Hernandez
Timo
T
Hagemann
Anna-Lena
AL
Heins
Hilde
H
Larsson
Lisa
L
Mears
Miguel
M
Mauricio-Iglesias
Ulrich
U
Krühne
Krist V
KV
Gernaey
D000465:Algorithms; D019149:Bioreactors; D018929:Cell Culture Techniques / Q000295:instrumentation; D003198:Computer Simulation; D005285:Fermentation; D057446:Hydrodynamics; D007218:Industrial Microbiology / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*
Computational fluid dynamics; Fermentation process development; Fungal morphology; Industrial biotechnology; Modeling; Scale-down bioreactors