BTG- Researcher-led Project

The complexity and number of reactions involved in a fermentation process prevent the direct determination of metabolites concentration profiles. The possibility of monitoring state transitions during the course of a fermentation through the analysis of on-line near-infrared (NIR) spectra with sample-sample two-dimensional correlation spectroscopy (SS-2DCoS) will be exploited for extracting process information. SS-2DCoS has the potential to identify fermentation state transitions due to metabolic and morphological changes of the microorganism, which could have a great impact for process supervision and control. This approach will be deployed to monitor fed-batch cultures of a major industrial expression system for biopharmaceuticals, Pichia pastoris.