Reference projects IME | Aachen

The junior research group "FAST-PEP," led by Dr. Johannes Buyel, aims to expand Fraunhofer IME's expertise in plant molecular farming and overcome key hurdles in bioprocess development within the plant/plant cell production system. The ATTRACT project seeks to establish a high-throughput expression and purification platform for pharmaceutically, agriculturally, and cosmetically relevant proteins, such as urgently needed vaccines and antibodies for cancer therapy, derived from plants and other biological sources. This system holds significant market potential because it can address the core challenges of bioprocess development.

The overarching goal of the Research Training Group (RTG) entitled "Tumor-Targeted Drug Delivery" (acronym 2(TD)) is to address current challenges in the development of cancer drug delivery systems (DDS) and to explore therapeutic and theranosetic scenarios that lead to improved patient outcomes and offer a clear perspective for clinical translation. While the majority of drug delivery research consortia in Germany and Europe primarily focus on novel materials for nanomedicine, 2(TD) will concentrate on medical needs and clinical applications, aiming to systematically identify and overcome pitfalls in the translation of tumor-targeted drug delivery concepts. To this end, the 2(TD) consortium will generate knowledge and foster collaboration at the interfaces of the key areas of tumor biology, chemical engineering, and clinical medicine.

The plant cell-based Plant Cell Pack (PCP) technology, developed at Fraunhofer IME, offers an alternative approach for the small-scale development of complex proteins. However, no technical solution currently exists to produce these proteins cost-effectively at a medium production scale using PCPs. The goal of the project is to scale up the PCP technology, which was originally designed for high-throughput screening of complex protein variants in microgram quantities (μg range), to enable rapid and flexible production processes in the gram range (g scale). Within the project, two technical approaches (centrifugation and filtration) and corresponding process control strategies (co-cultivation and incubation conditions) will be tested using a model protein. Subsequently, the product yields of three economically relevant proteins — a growth factor, a metabolic regulator, and an immunotoxin — will be compared. The most suitable method will be scaled up to a pilot level, with particular attention paid to ensuring that the technology can be seamlessly integrated into an industrial setting. The primary target group for the scaled PCP technology is small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) specializing in medium-scale recombinant protein production. These companies will be empowered to rapidly, flexibly, and cost-effectively produce not only simple but also complex proteins, thereby opening up new business opportunities.

The project aims to further develop a patent-pending technology that enables efficient and rapid genome editing, or genetic modification, of plants using laser-induced shock waves. Transferring this transformation method to important crop plants will lay the foundation for universal application in plant breeding.

Waterborne pathogens pose a significant risk to people, the environment, and the economy in drinking water systems, food production, agriculture, and healthcare and hygiene settings. Existing detection methods are often time-consuming, laboratory-based, and only insufficiently able to distinguish living microorganisms from those that have already been inactivated. As a result, key information needed for rapid and targeted contamination management is lacking. The Mi-LAMP aqua project is therefore developing a mobile and highly sensitive rapid test system for the on-site detection of waterborne pathogens. By combining magnetic enrichment technologies with advanced RNA-based amplification analytics, even low concentrations of bacteria, viruses, or protozoa can be detected quickly. At the same time, the method enables reliable differentiation between living and dead microorganisms directly on site for the first time, creating new opportunities for efficient hygiene monitoring and safe water surveillance.

Europe's bioeconomy is constrained by the limited and unsustainable supply of terrestrial natural products, creating dependency on fragile imports and placing increasing pressure on global ecosystems. Plant cell culture offers a land-independent and highly controllable alternative for producing high-value secondary metabolites. However, its broader industrial adoption remains limited by slow development cycles, the lack of standardised workflows, and high development costs. COCO-AI addresses these challenges by developing an AI-enabled platform for the data-driven engineering of plant cell cultures. Integrating the entire development pipeline—from callus induction and suspension cell line development to media optimisation, elicitation strategies, and process scale-up—the platform combines multi-omics, imaging, and bioprocess data within a unified AI agent that predicts optimal culture conditions, establishes standardised workflows, and substantially accelerates process development. Using cocoa as the industrial demonstrator, the platform will be validated up to industrial scale and established as a transferable technology for the sustainable production of high-value plant-derived natural products across multiple plant species. The key innovation of COCO-AI is the integration of an AI agent across the complete plant cell development and bioproduction pipeline, transforming today's empirical trial-and-error workflows into predictive, data-driven engineering processes for plant cell culture.

With the world's population steadily growing, global demand for food is increasing. The United Nations estimates that food production must double by 2050 to meet this demand. Furthermore, factors such as increasing urbanization and progressive climate change are leading to a scarcity of fertile arable land. All of this ultimately leads to the core problem: a gap exists between agricultural productivity and the global demand for food and crops. To close this gap, the EU project "PhotoBoost" is developing strategies to increase photosynthetic performance and productivity using the food crops potatoes and rice as examples.

In sub-Saharan Africa, the cowpea (Vigna unguiculata), also known as the eye bean, is a key source of plant-based protein. Although this crop exhibits relatively high drought tolerance and can grow even in low-fertility soils, its productivity is still too low to ensure adequate nutrition and economic sustainability. The overarching goal of “SCOPE” is to develop an innovative approach to increase the photosynthetic performance of the cowpea.

The global spread of bacteria resistant to many, or even almost all, known antibiotics poses an increasing threat to human and animal health. At the same time, hardly any new conventional antibiotics are being introduced to the market. Therefore, alternative approaches are urgently needed to effectively combat bacterial infections. One particularly promising approach involves endolysins. These are natural antibacterial enzymes originally produced by bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria. Endolysins can selectively destroy the protective cell wall of bacteria, thus acting very quickly and effectively. Despite this great potential, endolysins are currently used very little in medicine. Reasons for this include their often highly specific effects on individual bacterial strains, as well as unresolved issues regarding the safe, sustainable, and cost-effective production of large quantities of these active substances.

Functional proteins are essential building blocks in many industrial processes and products. They contribute to value creation in the bioeconomy and enable sustainable, resource-efficient solutions. Their applications range from food production (e.g., cheese making, fermentation, or juice clarification) to crop protection and medicine, and on to new technologies such as sensors or artificial photosynthesis. Previously, primarily naturally occurring proteins were used. Today, advances in structural biology, the understanding of structure-function relationships, and protein engineering—often supported by AI—enable the targeted development of new proteins. This results in many new candidates that must be tested using appropriate screening methods. Regardless of how they were designed, these proteins must be synthesized in the laboratory and their function verified before they can be further developed and produced on a larger scale.