Advances In Biotechnology For The Manufacture Of Commodity & Specialty Chemicals (Technical Insights)

Biotech has already shaken up the pharmaceutical industry, and it’s a certainty that it will change many other sectors of the chemical business. The principal objective of this study is to present a status report on the impetus which biotechnology is providing to enhance the commercial prospects for a broad range of commodity and specialty chemicals into the next millennium. The term “specialty chemicals” applies not just to bioproducts of the chemical industry, but also to pharmaceuticals, nutraceuticals, agrochemicals, and novel medicinal and veterinary compounds.

Enabling technologies such as genetic and enzymic transformations, genomics, proteomics, bioprocess integration, combinatorial chemistry, chiral technology, and so forth are presented in relation to the chemical entities whose production they facilitate. These innova-tive technologies are increasingly achieving targets within a more commercially viable environment. Assessments of current and potential commercial realities are made where such information is available, as are current and future market trends.

Although primarily concerned with microbial products, both plant and animal cell culture advances are discussed, principally in relation to both pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals in the former case and novel biopharmaceuticals in the latter.