For the past 50 years, column-based protein purification has remained more or less the same. Progress has been made in the development of new solid phases and modes of purification, but the technology and approach has essentially remained unchanged.
SMART Chromatography™ has changed this. Forever. A bold statement to be sure.
The principle behind SMART Chromatography™ is the direct application of fermentation broth (mammalian, yeast, bacterial, etc.) to a packed column. This allows for higher recovery of the desired target molecule at lower cost, with overall improvements in processing time and retention of biological activity of the purified biomolecule.
Originally designed as an alternative to Expanded Bed Adsorption (EBA), SMART Chromatography™ has been successfully used for a range of biomolecules from small proteins to monoclonal antibodies and, more recently, therapeutic virus vaccine purification. Work is also ongoing to demonstrate its suitability for VLP, DNA and IgM purification.
A linearly scalable technology, SMART Chromatography™ can be used for ion-exchange, hydrophobic interaction and affinity based purification systems as a primary capture. Processes may be developed in the R&D lab and scaled up for production with no change in the procedure. emp Biotech is also working on developing sterile ready-to-use single use columns for virus and vaccine production.