SiChem receives BMWi grant (ZIM) together with TU Clausthal for developing Smart Simulated Moving Bed Chromatography (sSMB)

Personalised medicine is about treating patients as individually as possible. The drugs administered should have an optimal effect. Often, the patient is given precisely tailored treatment strategies with several drugs that work in combination. However, this also means that there will be fewer and fewer blockbusters that are produced and used in large batches. In the long term, we will see an increase in the number of drugs that have to be produced in smaller batch sizes but with the same quality requirements as large batches.

The production of such high-purity products is complex and is often achieved by batch chromatography as a selective and efficient technique. Process design and up-scaling are relatively simple. However, good separation performance is offset by high product losses, relatively low productivity and, above all, high solvent consumption.

This can be changed by continuous chromatography processes: productivity increases by a factor of 3 to 30 and solvent reduction by a factor of 10 are possible.

Currently, there is a number of available techniques, starting with Simulated Moving Bed Chromatography (SMB), through various sequential multi-column connections, to more specialized processes such as Multicolumn Countercurrent Solvent Gradient Purification (MCSGP)

Each process offers its own advantages and areas of application, but also limitations. In common with the continuous processes is that they deliver very high product quality at high throughput. However, the complexity of several techniques with up to 8 chromatography columns and 5 gradient pumps is very high. These separation techniques are therefore expensive and rarely used in small research-based pharmaceutical companies.

In this project, a simplified smart SMB (sSMB) shall be developed that requires only one column but still uses several adsorbents.

 

The conference will take place from 12th to 15th of December at the Oregeon Health and Science University (OHSU) in Portland, USA.
This biennial international conference focuses on the growing intersection of chemical biology and physiology. This exciting field offers innovative opportunities for the development of drug targets and therapy concepts. Leading scientists from all over the world meet here to promote collaboration, and stimulate cutting-edge research. This year’s focus is on chemical physiology, imaging techniques, glycochemical biology, nucleotide chemistry and optical tools.

From Monday 21^st to Tuesday 22^nd October 2019 the Symposium of  Noncanonical amino acids – Tools for biological and biophysical investigations will be held in Paris. It is co-organized with the French Peptides and Proteins Group (GFPP)

This international symposium will focus on the emergent use of noncanonical amino acids (ncAAs) in peptide and protein science. It will bring together chemists, biochemists, biologists and biophysicists involved in the development of new technologies using ncAAs and in their application to biological questions.

SiChem offers a number of ncAAs for different experiments. Here you will find a selection of ncAAs

The aim of the project is the development of a new process for targeted and position-specific immobilization of enzymes on carrier materials. The immobilization of enzymes increases their stability and the possibility of reusability and allows catalytic steps to run more effectively and with higher turnover. The project will run for 36 months and has a volume of more than 500TEUR.