Biomanufacturing for Sustainability

Biomanufacturing for Sustainability and Health

Solving Critical Challenges

In state-of-art facilities and through collaborations with partners, WPI is harnessing cells, enzymes, and chemicals to build sustainable solutions for the world’s most critical challenges. Faculty and staff are developing new biomaterials, turning cells into factories, and converting waste into valuable products, all while training the next generation of biomanufacturing workers. 

CONTACT
Phone: 508-831-5000
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Biochemical Manufacturing

Biochemical Manufacturing 

WPI researchers are developing and refining new manufacturing processes for drugs, fuel, and other products in ways that positively impact the environment.  

Read how Professor Michael Timko is turning food waste into fuel. 

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Bio-inspired Materials

Bio-inspired Materials 

By looking to nature, WPI researchers are developing sustainable construction materials, wound dressings, and more.  

Read how Professors Suzanne Scarlata and Nima Rahbar are producing a low-cost negative-emission concrete.

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Environmental Sensors

Environmental Sensors 

New tools, models, and technologies are emerging from WPI labs to monitor environmental signals.  

Read how Assistant Professor Natalie Farny is using biology and engineering to monitor environmental contaminants.  

Preview Eric Young in his lab.

Synthetic Biology

Eric Young has received four separate grants totaling more than $2 million to support his research into using yeast and fungi to take on significant genetic engineering challenges. Engineering organisms to give them new abilities is leading to breakthroughs in the production of biofuels and plastics at WPI.

Read how Assistant Professor Eric Young is making the most of yeast and fungi

Partners and Funders

WPI faculty members collaborate with academic partners at UMass Chan Medical School and Clark University. Our faculty also work with companies such as Raytheon, Pfizer, Sanofi, AbbVie, and Saint Gobain. WPI’s research is supported by the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Defense Advanced Projects Research Agency, and other private and public funders. 

Biomanufacturing Research Facilities at WPI

Woman in the BETC at WPI.

BETC

The Biomanufacturing Education and Training Center at WPI’s Gateway Park in Worcester is where biotechnology professionals gain an edge. It’s an innovative partnership between academia and industry that creates customized workforce development solutions for forward-thinking biotechnology companies across the region and around the world.  

About the BETC
Man in the CERES Lab at WPI.

CERES

CERES@WPI is a fee-for-use facility designed to provide WPI researchers and regional industry and academic partners access to state-of-the-art instruments for quantitative analysis of engineered cells. It is located within the WPI Biomanufacturing Education and Training Center. 

About CERES
Student workers in the LEAP facility at WPI.

LEAP

Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) and Quinsigamond Community College (QCC) have partnered together to establish the Lab for Education & Application Prototypes (LEAP @ WPI/QCC), which is located at WPI's Gateway Park in Worcester, Massachusetts to help prototype world-changing integrated photonic devices, as well as develop the workforce needed to manufacture them. 

About LEAP

Faculty Experts

Faculty Profiles
Suzanne Scarlata
Suzanne Scarlata
Professor, Chemistry & Biochemistry
Suzanne Scarlata, Richard Whitcomb Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry, joined the university faculty in 2016. She studies how small molecules in the bloodstream can change the behavior of cells. In particular, she is interested in how certain hormones and neurotransmitters c [...]
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Eric Young
Eric Young
Associate Professor-Engineering, Chemical Engineering
From a chemical engineer's point of view, cells are treated as a catalyst that converts reactants to products. We design new catalysts, or "cell factories," to solve problems in biofuels, biomaterials, and biosensors.  Our strengths are in the disciplines of metabolic engineering [...]
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Natalie Farny
Natalie Farny
Associate Professor, Biology & Biotechnology
My lab works broadly in the emerging field of synthetic biology. Synthetic biology seeks to apply engineering design principles to the understanding and creation of biological systems. I use synthetic biology to design biosensors and bioremediation strategies for various environm [...]
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Michael Timko
Michael Timko
William B. Smith Professor and Department Head of Chemical Engineering, Chemical Engineering
Sharing that “ah hah” moment with a student struggling and suddenly mastering a difficult concept; helping expand the intellectual horizons of an aspiring engineer; tackling and solving problems that challenge the energy, economic, and environmental security with passionate stude [...]
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Susan Roberts
Susan Roberts
Affiliate Professor, Chemical Engineering
To me there is nothing more exciting than watching a student learn and develop and there is no greater privilege than having the title of professor. My favorite part of my job is being able to mentor and teach students in a research context – be that in a biochemical engineering [...]
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Andrew Teixeira
Andrew Teixeira
Associate Professor, Chemical Engineering
Andrew is a classically trained chemical engineer with with specialties in the fields of chemical reaction engineering and materials science. He received his B.S. from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in 2009, and continued to pursue his Ph.D. with Professor Dauenhauer at the Univ [...]
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