Biochemical engineering

Biochemical engineering is a branch of chemical engineering or biological engineering that mainly deals with the design and construction of unit processes that involve biological organisms or molecules. Biochemical engineering is often taught as a supplementary option to chemical engineering or biological engineering due to the similarities in both the background subject curriculum and problem-solving techniques used by both professions. Its applications are used in the food, feed, pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and water treatment industries.

Bioreactor:-

A bioreactor may refer to any device or system that supports a biologically active environment.[1] In one case, a bioreactor is a vessel in which is carried out a chemical process which involves organisms or biochemically active substances derived from such organisms. This process can either be aerobic or anaerobic. These bioreactors are commonly cylindrical, ranging in size from liters to cubic meters, and are often made of stainless steel.

A bioreactor may also refer to a device or system meant to grow cells or tissues in the context of cell culture. These devices are being developed for use in tissue engineering.

On the basis of mode of operation, a bioreactor may be classified as batch, fed batch or continuous (e.g. Continuous stirred-tank reactor model). An example of a continuous bioreactor is the chemostat.

Organisms growing in bioreactors may be suspended or immobilized. The simplest, where cells are immobilized, is a Petri dish with agar gel. Large scale immobilized cell bioreactors are:

* moving media
* packed bed
* fibrous bed
* membrane


More Details at wikipedia