Purification of advanced biological products using 3D-printed structures
Project ID: 2531bd1621
(You will need this ID for your application)
Research Theme: Engineering
Research Area(s): Engineering
UCL Lead department: Biochemical Engineering
Lead Supervisor: Thomas Johnson
Project Summary:
Emergent biological products e.g. viral vectors have demonstrated exciting clinical opportunities to treat previously incurable diseases. However, their inherent complexity presents considerable challenge for manufacturing them in an efficient, economically viable manner at appropriate scale to adress unmet medical need. The reliance on existing technologies that have been optimised in their chemical and physical properties towards simpler biologics renders their purification potential limited for these more complex products, resulting in extremely high price-tags. This project investigates the use of 3D printing to design and fabricate purification materials to enhance the consistency, efficiency and quality of medicine manufacturing for a range of products of interest.
3D-printing enables a great degree of control over the structure and chemical composition of the intended purification material when compared to reliance on vendor techologies. The inherent capability to design customisable materials will be explored to specifically tailor 3D-printed construct properites towards the needs of a range of complex biological products. Demonstrating enhanced purification performance of these products when compared to existing benchmarks is the major goal of this doctorate. The project builds upon bioprocessing expertise within the UCL Department of Biochemical Engineering and 3D printing research in this space within the ‘Recovery of Biological Products’ group, in particular the application of advanced imaging techniques to inform design of new puridification materials.
Primary Supervisor: Dr Thomas Johnson Subsidiary Supervisor: Prof Daniel Bracewell
Project timeline:
Year 1: Demonstrate 3D printed column purification of model products e.g. model proteins and monoclonal antobodies, 1st year report
Year 2: Identify and tailor designs to the needs for optimal purification of more advanced products e.g. viral vectors, 1st paper draft
Year 3: Create framework for optimising purification structure properties for emergent and future biologics, international conference presentation
Year 4: Investigate 3D printed monoliths for primary recovery and cell therapies, thesis write-up