Industrial Biotransformations

7
Quantitative Analysis of Industrial Biotransformations
Adrie J. J. Straathof
The number of biotransformation processes that are carried out on an industrial scale is
almost doubling every decade [1]. At present there are about 150 processes that are
known to fulfill the following criteria:
. They describe a reaction or a set of simultaneous reactions in which a pre-formed precursor
molecule is converted; as opposed to fermentation processes with de novo production
from a source of carbon and energy, such as glucose, via the primary metabolism.
. They involve the use of enzymes and/or whole cells, or combinations thereof, either
free or immobilized.
. They lead to the production of a fine-chemical or commodity product, which is usually
recovered after the reaction.
. They have been reported to be operated on a commercial scale, or have been successfully
scaled-up and announced to be commercialized at a scale of usually more than 100 kg a –1 .
In this chapter these processes will be quantitatively analyzed in order to obtain a better
overview of the current status of industrial biotransformations. Most of the processes
included in this analysis have been described in detail in the previous chapter of this
book. However, some particular processes were left out of this analysis. These involve
processes that have clearly only been performed on a pilot scale and also degradation processes,
in which the biotransformation is used for removing an undesired compound
rather than for making a desired product.
In addition, this analysis does include processes that have not been described in the previous
chapter. This is due to the problem that public domain sources sometimes give incomplete
or conflicting information. Moreover, some existing processes have not been described
at all in public domain sources. Therefore, despite a number of additions and corrections
since an earlier report [1], the numbers given in the quantitative information provided here
cannot be taken as absolute numbers, but they will probably show the correct trends.
One aspect of the information that is only being reported in a modest number of cases is
the operation scale of the processes. There are nine processes that are operated on a scale of
more than 10000 t a –1 . These are mostly used for the production of carbohydrates, and
applied in the food sector. Non-carbohydrate biotransformation products that are produced
on a bulk scale are the monomer acrylamide and the pharmaceutical intermediate 6-amino-
Industrial Biotransformations. Andreas Liese, Karsten Seelbach, Christian Wandrey (Eds.)
Copyright © 2006 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim
ISBN: 3-527-31001-0
515