Akb. Frej et al., EXPANDED BED ADSORPTION AT PRODUCTION SCALE - SCALE-UP VERIFICATION, PROCESS EXAMPLE AND SANITIZATION OF COLUMN AND ADSORBENT, Bioprocess engineering, 16(2), 1997, pp. 57-63
Expanded bed adsorption is a technique for recovery of biomolecules di
rectly from unclarified feedstocks. The work described here demonstrat
es that expanded bed adsorption is a scaleable technique. The methods
used to test scaleability were ''determination of degree of bed expans
ion'', ''determination of axial dispersion'' and ''determination of pr
otein breakthrough capacity''. The performance of a production scale e
xpanded bed column with 600 mm diameter was tested using these methods
and the results were found to be consistent with the results obtained
from lab scale and pilot scale expanded bed columns. The scaleability
and function of the expanded bed technique was also tested by perform
ing a ''process example'': a purification mimicking a real process usi
ng a yeast culture spiked with bovine serum albumin as feedstock. The
results show that the 600 mm diameter production scale column was as e
fficient as a 25 mm diameter lab scale column in recovering bovine ser
um albumin from the unclarified yeast culture. The production scale ru
ns were fully automated using a software controlled system containing
an adaptor position sensor and an adsorbent sensor. A cleaning study w
as performed which showed that after use of a proper cleaning protocol
, no surviving microorganisms could be detected in the column or in th
e adsorbent.