A Bioprocess Design for Microbial Production of Taxol

Project Summary

Paclitaxel (Taxol) is a small molecule drug belonging to the taxane family. It is one of the most commonly used chemotherapeutics, used for treatment of many cancers, as a monotherapy or in combination with other drugs to treat breast, lung and ovarian cancer as well as Kaposi’s sarcoma. Taxol is on the World Health Organization’s (WHO) List of Essential Medicines, a list that includes most the important medications for basic health. The worldwide demand for paclitaxel is exceeding the current supply. 

Themes and Categories
Health
Health Systems Operations
Year
2015

In addition the current cost of paclitaxel limits use in many parts of the developing world. Lower cost sources of paclitaxel can have an immediate impact to human health worldwide. Currently taxol is approved in the U.S. as first line of treatment for breast, ovarian and non-small cell lung cancer. The annual new cases of these cancers are ~ 540,000 in the United States.

Project Team

  • Banskota, S.
  • Ciesla T.J.
  • Moreb, E.

BME 590-02 Fall 2015 

Project Details

Market size: U.S. market : 1,100 kg per year

Process design included:

  • Genetically engineered E. coli Strain
  • Heterologous Taxol production pathway
  • Engineered host strain
  • GMP fermentation process
  • 5 step downstream recovery process 

Results

Our conceptual design results in cost competitive production 

  • $0.43/mg - including a 25% return
  • ~$ 5M in capital investment
  • Current pricing is ~ $0.50/mg 

Download the project poster for more details (PDF).

Related People

Related Projects

Piloting an Environmental Public Health Tracking Tool for North Carolina

The natural and built environment can both promote and harm the public’s health. Some states have created interactive web-portals to help visualize how health and environmental measures relate…North Carolina wants to be next! The Data+ student team, led by epidemiologist Mike Dolan Fliss and colleagues from the NC Division of Public Health (DPH), will build a pilot Environmental Public Health Tracking (EPHT) tool for NC. Students will analyze and combine spatial health, environmental, and point-source data from NC DPH and other partners, then co-design and prototype visual dashboards for public use.

Project Leads: Mike Dolan Fliss, Kim Gaetz

Project Manager: Melyssa Minto

A Bayesian Framework for Joint Analysis of Heterogeneous Neuroscience Data

This paper addresses analysis of heterogeneous data, such as ordered, categorical, real and count data. Such data are of interest in our motivating application, cognitive and brain science, in which subjects may answer questionnaires, and also (separately) undergo fMRI interrogation. A contribution of this paper concerns the joint analysis of how people answer questionnaires and how their brain responds to external stimuli (here visual), the latter measured via fMRI.

Charting and Mapping Vaccine Development Capacities

With the significant international consequences of recent outbreaks, the ITP Lab conducted extensive stakeholder interviews and macro-level health policy analysis to expose gaps in pandemic preparedness and develop legal frameworks for future threats. 

See all Research