After this course all learners will be able to:
1. appreciate the need for sustainable innovation and how biotechnology and biobased production can contribute to this
2. describe the global context of biobased production
3. map the biobased economy, from research to application and from raw materials to products
4. solve basic level calculations in bioprocess engineering.

Verified learners will have the added benefit of being able to:
5. integrate scientific and technological knowledge on the use of bioprocesses for industrial products at the cell and process level
6. develop and assess the conditions for efficient and sustainable design of bioprocesses
7. solve undergraduate engineering level calculations in bioprocess engineering.

Unit 1. Biotechnology for Biobased Products

• Why develop a biobased economy?
• Industrial biotechnology
• Feedstocks - renewable sources of biomass for biobased products
• Process to produce bio-PDO (1,3-Propanediol)
• Benefits for society and sustainability - evaluating the effects of biobased production

Unit 2. Balances and Microbial Rates

• Microorganisms and their function in nature
• Functional understanding of nutrient requirements for microbial growth
• Learning about the process: Broth balances
• Learning about the process: Gas phase balances
• Learning about the microorganism: q-rates and chemostat
• Learning about the process and organism

Unit 3. The Black Box Model and Process Reaction

• The process reaction
• Basics of the black box model
• Energy consuming and energy producing products
• A PDO black box model: experiments for parameter identification
• Black box models: The PDO process reaction as function of μ
• PDO continuous process design: calculation of inputs and outputs using the process reaction
• Aerobic PDO process: improving sustainability
• Introduction to Metabolic Flux Analysis

Unit 4. Fermentation Design

• Introduction to fermentation technology
• The large-scale fermenter
• Fermenter operation
• Gas transport
• Heat transport
• Mixing
• Basic approach to design and then optimize a PDO fermentation process

Unit 5. Up- and Down-stream process integration

• Towards an integrated bioprocess
• Pre-treatment
• Separation and formulation
• Separation principles
• Conceptual process design for 1,3 PDO production
• Process integration for 1,3 PDO production

Unit 6. Process Evaluation and Sustainability

• Designing a sustainable business case
• Economics of a process design
• Environmental assessment of a process design
• Social sustainability
• Sustainability in a global context

Over 25 employees of Zymergen participated in the online course "Industrial Biotechnology" offered by TU Delft. This resulted in increased understanding of microbial physiology and fermentation technology and how to scale up bioproduction processes. Through this course, the quality of our R &D work will further improve and timelines for commercialization of bioprocesses will be shortened

Stefan de Kok, Director Fermentation - Zymergen