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The DASGIP AG has geared its bioreactor technology towards the needs for biofuel development. The new system provides anaerobic working conditions, separate monitoring and control of pH and redox potential as well as new gassing modules, which supply either one bioreactor with a defined gas mix or four reactors with freely selectable, independently routed input gasses.

Redox
When working with anaerobic organisms, monitoring of redox potential plays a key role in the bioconversion process, as anaerobic cells require negative Eh values to be active. For example, most methanogens will not grow above a redox of -0.33 V. DASGIP's PH4RD4 module measures pH and redox potential for four bioreactors individually thus helps to identify acceptable conditions throughout the process. Additionally, the redox potential affects the solubility of nutrients in anaerobic fermentation. Therefore, measuring the redox value helps to create a favourable environment for microbial growth and metabolism.

Gassing
Many biochemical processes involve a wide range of gasses, such as nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide and sometimes methane and carbon monoxide. To cater to the needs for gassing flexibility in these processes, DASGIP has broadened its advanced gassing solutions: With the MX4/1, one bioreactor is supplied with a mix of up to four mass-flow controlled input gasses. With the MF4 gassing module, users are able to select any four gasses blended with mass-flow controllers to four bioreactors. Separate gas leads allow gassing not only of common gasses such as oxygen or carbon dioxide but also of methane, carbon monoxide or other gasses.

Four optional pressure sensors at the outputs provide safe operation of glass vessels and bags with both gassing modules. With flow rates up to 30 sL/min per channel, both versions can serve working volumes up to pilot scale.

Instrumented Vessels
DASGIP glass vessels are suitable for aerobic and anaerobic conditions. Sizes range from 150 mL up to 6 Liters working volume in microbial application. In-house developed head plates give access to industry sensors to measure pH, temperature, optical density and pO2/redox. This provides both industry quality measurements of parameters and high compatibility of DASGIP equipment with other bioreactor systems and large scale manufacturing equipment.

SOURCE: DASGIP AG