Rotating spiral bioreactor to revolutionise biomanufacturing

A scalable bioreactor delivering superior performance and precise control of biocatalytic processes for sustainable chemicals manufacturing.

A spiral bioreactor
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Background

The world is facing a climate emergency. We are heading towards exceeding the critical 1.5°C global warming threshold by 2035. Achieving sustainable, net-zero practices in the chemicals manufacturing sector, which is the third largest consumer of fossil resources and carbon emitters, is crucial for mitigating global warming.

Biotechnological manufacturing of chemicals using cell-free and (recombinant) whole cell catalytic systems can be an environmentally-friendly, net-zero alternative to fossil-based manufacturing. We contend that the major challenges of biotechnological manufacturing are: (i) its inability to compete with fossil-based manufacturing in terms of cost-effectively scaling up the volume of production, and (ii) its low volumetric productivity, resulting from the use of stirred-tank bioreactors.

Solution

We have built prototypes and submitted for patenting the design of a compact, high-performance, continuous bioreactor based on a rotating spiral format [WO/2025/056900]. The unique advantages of this technology are:

  1. Its inherent potential to achieve scale-up from the R&D lab to manufacturing in a single step. 

  2. Its demonstrated 75-fold increase in volumetric productivity. 

Unilever Ltd has submitted a patent for the use of this technology for the manufacture of ingredients for home and personal care products [WO/2025/056452]. Our bioreactor is a powerful enabling technology that underpins not only increased productivity within existing biotechnological manufacturing processes but also will help environmentally-friendly, biotechnological manufacturing of new classes of chemicals previously considered too challenging to produce using conventional strategies. We envision this technology will support the realisation of the bioeconomy and will accelerate the global transition to the net-zero carbon economy.

Benefits

  • Demonstrated 75x increase in productivity per volume.
  • Single-step scale-up from R&D to industrial manufacturing.
  • Continuous operation.
  • Flexibility in the choice of biocatalyst and operating scale.
  • Compact bench-top design.