Ramakrishnan, D., Curtis W.R., Growth and mass transfer characterization of trickle bed reactors towards large scale growth of plant root cultures, ACS National Meeting, Boston, August 23-27, 1998

Abstract:
A wide variety of reactor configurations have been proposed for plant root culture growth, in published literature. Since chemicals of interest are produced in relatively low titers in plant tissue culture systems, the ability of a reactor design to sustain high density culture growth is critical to consider commercialization. In this paper, pilot scale results will be presented to show that trickle bed root reactors can sustain record tissue densities (as high as 36 g DW / L). Reactor operating conditions which result in growth rates indistinguishable from the lab-scale bench mark (the shaker flask) will also be identified. These results represent the highest reported tissue densities and the highest growth rates when compared with published root reactor data. In addition, a preliminary scale-up feasibility of this configuration will be presented.