Content

BEC 577/CHE 577
Advanced Biomanufacturing and Biocatalysis

Course Description

This is an advanced overview of topics in industrial biomanufacturing using microorganisms and cell lines (bacteria, yeast, fungi), eukaryotic cells (insect, CHO) and recombinant enzymes engineered for industrial applications. This course focuses on how microbes, cell lines and enzymes are used to manufacture foods, pharmaceuticals, biopharmaceuticals, consumer products and biomaterials regulated by the U.S. FDA. Advanced protein engineering, gene expression and cellular pathway engineering techniques are presented along with methods to screen for and generate improved enzymes as biocatalysts. Industry examples will be presented on how microbial metabolism is “engineered” to generate strains capable of producing: organic acids, amino acids, alcohols, chemical intermediates, lipids, polyketides, carbohydrate and peptide antibiotics, biopolymers (carbohydrate polymers, polyesters), or to alter pathways to generate novel bio-active metabolites. This class will also present concepts and ‘strategy’ in screening using engineered microbes, cell lines and screening the metagenome for new drug substance discovery. A major emphasis of the course is on how to choose microbial/cell line host & vector expression systems for the production of heterologous peptides, proteins, antibodies or glycoproteins and how this choice affects overall biomanufacturing process strategy. An overview of cell growth kinetics and immobilized biocatalyst kinetics is included as well as discussion of intellectual property (IP), ethical and social/perception of risk implications of producing products from genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Emphasis will be given on each student designing and presenting an effective technical poster on a process using engineered microbes or enzymes along with a comprehensive final paper based on the same topic.