"A lot of customers are already waiting for the BioLector® Pro Technology and are now impatient to get it into their hands." reports Dr. Frank Kensy, Managing Director of m2p-labs, in regard to the market launch.
BioLector® Pro works with 32 parallel microbioreactors and 16 reservoirs for substrate- and pH-solutions at a micro-scale of 1-2 mL. The system uses online optical measurements of all standard fermentation parameters such as biomass concentration, pH- and DO-values as well as fluorescence in 32 parallel microbioreactors. In addition, the BioLector® Pro can control pH-values and run substrate feeding profiles individually to realize controlled fed-batch fermentations. The main advantage of using the BioLector® Pro is, that all 32 bioreactors and 16 reservoirs fit into the footprint of a standard microtiter plate and the whole microfluidic plate is available as a single-use reactor system and ready to use. Therefore, the set up time of the bioreactors can be reduced to almost zero and thus, the system's hardware can be used at a maximum of efficiency. The new microfluidic bioreactor system of BioLector® Pro is considered a new platform technology for bioprocess development. Applications such as clone screening, media- and fermentation optimization as well as bioprocess characterization can now be performed under controlled reaction conditions similar to production scale. The use of this new disposable technology promises to reduce working efforts, time and development costs.
With the development of the BioLector® Pro, m2p-labs directly responds to the demand from pharmaceutical, bio-based and chemical industry for controlled microfermentation systems, as well as achieves an important milestone in the history of the company. "This new generation of microbioreactors with integrated microfluidics paves the way for a new era of bioprocess development. The effort needed to run normal lab-fermenters is not necessary anymore. Scientists want to receive meaningful process data and do not like to spend time cleaning, preparing and calibrating the bioreactors. The BioLector® Pro is a "Plug and Play" system and generates all relevant fermentation data automatically under controlled and production-like conditions." describes Dr. Kensy.
m2p-labs anticipates a huge market potential for the new microfluidic chip technology. Fluid transport at micro-scale is a general need in life science R&D; therefore m2p-labs anticipates further markets in biotechnology and medicine. The expansion of application fields for the BioLector® Pro platform is an exciting area to grow the company in the coming years.