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next question is: How will these changes affect the microbial kinetics (or physiology) in
the large-scale process? Our prime concern is the concentration gradients that may occur
due to poor mixing in large-scale reactors, but also effects by shear stress may need to
be considered. In large-scale aerated reactors there will almost certainly be gradients
present, both with respect to oxygen, and, in case of fed-batch or continuous operation,
most likely also with respect to the limiting substrate. In the presence of gradients, the
overall average volumetric reaction rate vector, Qav is therefore an integral property
according to Eq. (11.29).
Thus, the entire concentration field need to be known, as well as the kinetic expression
giving the direct concentration effects on volumetric rates, as discussed in chapter 7.
Major changes of the overall metabolism may occur as a function of substrate or oxygen
concentration, e.g. in organisms exhibiting overflow metabolism or anaerobic
metabolism. This is true for both the industrially important organisms S. cerevisiae and E.
coli (see Fig 2.6 and Example 7.3). Ethanol formation in S. cerevisiae will rapidly occur if
oxygen is depleted. The intracellular response in NADH levels to a high glucose
concentration has been found to occur within a few seconds.
Microbial kinetics is, furthermore, not only determined by the local concentrations, but
also by the time history of the organisms. Cells will experience a changing environment
as they circulate in a large-scale reactor. This periodic change in extracellular conditions
may trigger regulatory phenomena, e.g. gene expression turn-on or turn-off (see Fig. 2.2).
It is for example well known that both oxygen and glucose trigger several regulatory
responses. The response time will be determined by the rate of mRNA polymerization and
the rate of translation (Konz et al., 1998). In a study by Schweder et al. 1999, seven
different mRNA levels in E. coli were studied in a scaled-down system. It was found that
the transcription of several genes, such as the proU gene, which is involved in
osmoregulation, responded within 15 s of exposure to high glucose concentration. The
rate of protein synthesis is probably somewhat lower. The peptide elongation rate has
been estimated to be between 13-16 amino acids per second in E. coli (Einsele et al.,
1978, see also Note 7 .6). For this reason, a single "dip" in oxygen concentration of short
duration does not necessarily result in a change in the overall protein synthesis pattern.
However, the effects of repeated depletions, as occuring for a cell circulating in a largescale bioreactor, are indeed difficult to predict and need to be studied experimentally
It is clearly expensive to do the experiments in the actual large-scale bioreactor, and
scale-down experiments are therefore made. Concentration gradients can be created by
making step-change experiments in a laboratory scale stirred tank reactor, or by
connecting two small reactors. Step- change experiments in one reactor can be used to
study dynamic effects of a sudden increase in glucose concentration or aerobic/anaerobic
transitions. In a sense one can say that an experimental "compartment system" is used
to mimic the large-scale reactor. A compilation of such experimental studies is given by
Lidn (2001). A very rapid mixing of glucose can be obtained in a laboratory reactor.
However, the oxygen transfer rate is not sufficiently high to enable studies of fast
dynamics related to aerobic/anaerobic transitions. A combination of a stirred tank reactor
and a plug flow reactor may in this case be a better option (George et al., 1993).
The a priori expectation is probably that gradients will have a negative effect on process
performance, this has also been reported for e.g. biomass yield. However, not all results
show a decreased performance in large-scale. The leavening capacity of Baker's yeast
was found to be higher in both a scaled-down model system and a large-scale process
compared to an ideally mixed system (George et al., 1998). Furthermore, the stability of a
heterologous protein was found to increase in a non-ideally mixed system (Bylund et al,
2000).
Also shear rates may be a concern for shear sensitive organisms. This normally does not
apply to yeast or bacteria, whereas mammalian cells or plant cells are shear sensitive
(Tanaka, 1981). The situation is complicated by the fact that the average shear rate
normally decreases during scale-up, whereas the maximum shear rate normally
increases. Again, an "oscillating environment" with respect to shear will be sensed by the
organisms during circulation.
Another factor to keep in mind is that the requirement for culture stability increases. The
actual number of generations in the large-scale process depends on the inoculation
density. However, even if a high inoculation density is used, the number of generation
from the stock culture to the final harvesting increases rather much, and possible genetic
instabilities of the production strain will therefore be more pronounced.
A final, unpleasant, surprise experienced in many large-scale processes is foaming.
Foaming is caused by surface-active components that are excreted or released through
cell breakage. Foaming is normally manageable in lab-scale experiments, but in a Iargescale reactor unexpected foaming can become a major problem.