Gene would much rather be riding the fast train and surfing the waves, but sadly he’s stuck on the slow train. Inoculum train expansion can be exhausting. Help is on its way though, in the shape of process intensification.
Gene sure needs a break. Seed train expansion can be grueling, time-consuming work. Regularly counting cells and then step-by-step moving the culture to larger vessels certainly seem less exciting than driving a train through breathtaking landscapes. There’s also an obvious risk for contamination during this manual process. Luckily, there is a solution.
Many inoculum trains involve five to ten steps. But with perfusion cell culturing you can take this down to one simple step, moving from a high-density cell bank vial to a 2000 L bioreactor. Just like that. That way you can reduce processing time, simplify operations, and maximize equipment use.
The benefits of replacing multiple flask-based steps with a perfusion process using a single-use bioreactor are many. You need fewer consumables, less space, and less time. The process can cut a 3 to 4-week process down to less than 2 weeks. Instead of staring at flasks, Gene now has time to ride the waves in his new rocking bioreactor.