Conference 7.286::space

761.0. "NASA CCDS introduces new space-based processing effort" by PRAGMA::GRIFFIN (Dave Griffin) Wed Oct 16 1991 14:49

Barbara E. Selby
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.                     October 16, 1991

Barbara A. Hale
Center for Cell Research, Penn. State U., State College

RELEASE:  91-172


        Pennsylvania State University's Center for Cell Research (CCR), State
College, a NASA Center for the Commercial Development of Space, has
begun a new space program to enable American industry to enhance the
purification and processing of cells, subcelluar particles, proteins, growth
factors and other biological products.

        The new program --  U.S. Commercial Electrophoresis Program in
Space (USCEPS) -- is the first to couple industry access to space-based
systems with ground-based mathematical modeling services.  The modeling
service will enable industrial clients to evaluate, prior to flight, how much
improvement the microgravity environment of space will produce.

        Electrophoresis is a processing technique widely used on Earth.  It
separates desired biological material from a mixture on the basis of
electrical charge.  During flights aboard the Space Shuttle in the 1980s, the
McDonnell Douglas Corp. was able to separate up to 718 times more
material and to reach purity levels four times higher than ground units.

        The USCEPS builds on Penn State expertise and a decade of intensive
process development and flight experimentation conducted by McDonnell
Douglas, which is participating in this effort as a subcontractor.

        Penn State participants include Dr. W.C. Hymer, Director of the CCR,
who performed the first pituitary cell electrophoretic separation in
microgravity in 1983; Dr. J. Lawrence Duda, professor and head of the
Department of Chemical Engineering, a specialist in mathematical
modeling and chemical processing; Dr. Ali Borhan, assistant professor of
chemical engineering, a specialist in fluid dynamics; and Dr. Alfred Carlson,
assistant professor of chemical engineering, a specialist in bioprocessing.

        Others include Dr. Wayne Lanham and David Richman of McDonnell
Douglas and Alan Rose of Commercial Payloads, Inc.  Lanham, Richman and
Rose were members of the original McDonnell Douglas team.

        The USCEPS team will begin work on a new engineering concept in
November and expects to have a unit built, flight-qualified and ready for
service aboard a SPACEHAB Shuttle flight in 1994.  Units will be
customized to meet industry demand.

        New bioseparation and bioprocessing techniques are a major need in
the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries where innovative genetic
engineering approaches have produced unique separation and processing
problems.  Every new biotechnology product must be removed or separated
from the materials in which and from which it was produced.  Each new
product represents a new production processing problem that must be
solved before it can go to market.

        For example, inclusion bodies, tiny packets of product that form
within the genetically engineered bacteria used in manufacturing,
represent one class of biotechnology processing problems.  Carlson
estimates that 80 percent of products currently produced via genetically
engineered cells -- everything from insulin to milk coagulating agents --
form first as inclusion bodies.  Ten years ago inclusion bodies were of
limited interest.  Today, they represent a whole new field that seems
ideally suited to free-flow electrophoresis, he said.

        Any company that recognizes the potential of commercial space
activities is welcome to approach the center about a possible collaboration
on space- based separations, said Hymer.

        The Center for Cell Research is one of three biologically focused
CCDSs.  It is the only center to offer a space-based bioprocessing service.