Overview

The Bio-Gentle Autumn School (30 September – 3 October 2025, Lancaster University) brings together leading experts to explore biomolecules, their properties, and industrial applications. Across four days, participants will gain insights into macromolecules of industrial and diagnostic importance, biopharmaceutical products, and membrane biofouling. IChemE will stream selected highlights, including Professor Cristiana Boi (University of Bologna) on industrial macromolecules and biopharmaceutical molecules, Dr Antoine Kemperman (University of Twente) on biofouling in membrane separations, and Dr Lucy Beales (Global Access Diagnostics) on macromolecules in the diagnostic sector. This training fosters cross-disciplinary learning at the interface of biology, chemistry, and engineering.

Biopharmaceuticals, also known as biologics, are medicines that are inherently biological and are manufactured using living organisms or cells from living organisms. They include complex molecules, such as proteins and nucleic acids, as well as components like viruses and living cells. Biopharmaceuticals can be divided into four major product classes: protein therapeutics, vaccines, gene therapy, and cell therapy. In this lecture, we will present these four classes, beginning with the largest class, protein therapeutics, and ending with an outlook on future biotherapeutics, such as mRNA products, CAR-T and gene therapies. Proteins play a fundamental role in biopharmaceuticals. They can be products, such as insulin, or they can be part of a cell or a virus. An example is the spike protein of SARSCoV-2. The many biological activities carried out by proteins lead to numerous ways they can be used for therapeutic benefit, which is why protein therapeutics are so common. One class of protein therapeutics is monoclonal antibodies. Their ability to bind to specific molecules enables the treatment of diseases such as different type of cancer, autoimmune diseases and many other.

Speaker

Cristiana Boi, Professor, University of Bologna

Cristiana is an Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering at Alma Mater Studiorum-Università di Bologna, Italy and a Research Associate Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, NC, USA. She holds the Italian Habilitation as Full Professor for the academic field ICHI-01/B Chemical Engineering Principles. She graduated in Chemical Engineering from the University of Bologna in 1991 and obtained her PhD in Chemical and Environmental Engineering from the University of Bologna in 1996, with a joint project with Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy NY, USA.

Her research interests are in downstream processing in biotechnology with a focus on membranes and chromatographic processes for highly selective separations. In particular, she is interested in the preparation, modification and characterization of functional materials for bio-separations, biomedical applications, water purification and the production of biopharmaceuticals. Cristiana has published 57 articles in high-impact peer-reviewed journals, three book chapters and presented more than 130 papers at international conferences. She is an editor for Separation and Purification Technology and member of the Editorial Board of Membranes.

She has supervised/co-supervised 11 PhD students and 81 MSc students and is currently supervising five PhD students and eight MSc students. She has been the
President of the European Membrane Society for 2017 and 2018, the Funding Secretary of the World Association of Membrane Societies for 2017-2020, and is the
current Chair of the Area 2G, Bioseparations, of the AIChE.

The material presented has not been peer-reviewed. Any opinions are the presenters' own and do not necessarily represent those of IChemE or the North Lancashire Member Group. The information is given in good faith but without any liability on the part of IChemE.

Webinar recording