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the air is crisp and clear in autumn, and a small patch of marigolds is blooming in perfect bloom on the rooftop garden of micro-metal synthesis, a synthetic biology company. these marigolds are not planted just for ornamental purposes.

"in the past, it took a year to produce 1 ton of lutein by planting 250 acres of marigolds. however, the synthetic biological manufacturing technology we developed can be done in less than 10 days using a 300 cubic meter jar." weiyuan liu bo, founder and ceo of hesheng, sounded proud. the birth of new technology is expected to rewrite the history of inefficient extraction of lutein by sacrificing soil fertility and planting large quantities of marigolds.

not only lutein, but also collagen, psicose, cell gene therapy drugs... using gene screening, editing and other technologies to design, and then using bio-manufacturing technology for production, theoretically "all things can be made". biomanufacturing technologies represented by synthetic biology, biopharmaceuticals, etc. are surging around the world, and beijing is also developing this future industry to position itself as the third biotechnology revolution.

synthetic biology opens a new era of creation

how do humans obtain the materials they need? looking back at history, we have obtained from nature, cultivated and improved crops, chemical synthesis...technological innovations have been rolling forward like wheels from generation to generation, and now a new chapter is opening, called "synthetic biology".

"bio-manufacturing is actually not a new concept. it can be traced back to human fermentation technology for making wine and vinegar." liu bo introduced. why is this ancient technology now gradually considered the "third biotechnology revolution"? this is because humans are designing and transforming living organisms through molecular biological means such as gene editing, and are gradually finding the key to independently designing "creation factories."

every day, in the micro-element synthesis laboratory, a large number of experimenters hold test tubes of biological preparations and are busy in front of the experimental equipment for screening and editing of engineering bacteria to obtain valuable bacterial strains. bacteria are just that “key”. "for a long time in the past, the emergence and improvement of bacterial strains required 'depending on the sky', but now we have the 'hand of god' that can design their birth." liu bo said.

what kind of "magic factory" will these designed strains of bacteria open? take allulose, for example, which is a naturally occurring rare sugar found in dried figs that tastes close to sucrose but has almost no calories. however, this healthy sugar is currently very expensive due to the complicated dual-enzyme isomerization and separation production methods, making it difficult for ordinary people to enjoy it. after independent research and development, weiyuan synthesis has created a unique bacterial strain in the world that can directly ferment glucose as raw material to produce psicose, and greatly increase the conversion rate by more than 60%. similar projects of the company also include biosynthetic technologies such as lutein and mannitol.

similar to the magical biosynthetic reaction induced by small strains of bacteria in the synthesis tank, micro-element synthesis is also like a "seed", driving the future industry of synthetic biology to gather in northern beijing. in 2022, this company settled in changping district and has grown rapidly in the past few years. now, the 2,000 square meters of office experimental space in the first phase is no longer enough. this year, a 3,000 square meter second phase experimental office space was expanded. at the end of this year, the company's first production base and engineering amplification center in qinhuangdao, hebei will also be put into use.

it is precisely because of the high growth potential of this type of synthetic biology companies that at the beginning of this year, changping district proposed to build the zhongguancun synthetic biology manufacturing industry cluster, focusing on the future science city, to connect the "energy valley" and the "life valley" in an orderly manner. four major functional areas are planned and constructed in a step-by-step and orderly manner: innovation incubation area, transformation acceleration area, high-end manufacturing area, and headquarters office area.

"we are located in the 'energy valley' of the future science city, which is also the 150,000-square-meter starting area for synthetic biology that has started construction in advance. there are not only innovative companies like us that settled early, but also central enterprises such as cofco, which will let’s work together to develop a new track for synthetic biology,” liu bo said.

cell gene therapy allows drugs to be "tailor-made"

in addition to producing food, energy, new materials, etc. through biosynthesis, the magic of biomanufacturing technology is also reflected in "tailor-made" and precise treatment drugs.

at the 2024 service trade fair, which concluded not long ago, in the specialty and new exhibition area of ​​hall 2 of shougang park, two bags of seemingly inconspicuous cell injections attracted the attention of many professional audiences. both products are gene cell therapy drugs for advanced cancer. among them, the im19 car-t cell injection for the end-line treatment of diffuse large b-cell lymphoma has completed phase ii clinical trials and will submit a marketing application by the end of this year. it is expected that it will be approved for listing next year. this product is expected to break the foreign monopoly and become the first domestic car-t original research drug approved to be marketed for the treatment of advanced lymphoma.

car-t cell drug therapy is a personalized treatment method for malignant tumors that uses the body's own immune system. "some tumor cells are very cunning and can evade recognition and attack by immune cells t cells through various mechanisms." he ting, founder and ceo of beijing yimiao shenzhou medical technology co., ltd., vividly introduced that after extracting the patient's own t cells, use gene editing methods to install car, a special molecule similar to a "key", and then infuse the car-t cells back into the patient's body. they will hold the "key" and move around in the human body. once they come into contact with something with a specific "lock" tumor cells, car-t cells will be activated and kill and eliminate tumor cells.

in beijing, there are many innovative pharmaceutical companies like yimiao shenzhou that are developing cell and gene therapies. t cells are extracted and isolated from the patient's blood, introduced into the relevant genes, and then undergo culture amplification, detection and other processes. after about 14 days, a customized cell gene therapy drug will be born... now, in the innovative pharmaceutical company huaxia ying in tai's laboratory, about 6 such "tailor-made" cell genetic drugs are generated every month and put into early clinical research on tumors and autoimmune diseases.

in recent years, cell-based genetic drugs have begun to show miraculous effects in the treatment of cancer, rare diseases, etc., and have become a popular track for medical development. however, this new treatment still has many shortcomings and pain points. zhao xueqiang, co-founder of huaxia yingtai, told reporters that one of the pain points is that it is difficult to achieve large-scale preparation due to the need to collect patients’ autologous cells to make medicines. therefore, the price is high, and one injection often costs millions of yuan.

how to solve this problem? this year, at shanghai changzheng hospital, a patient who had unfortunately suffered from systemic lupus erythematosus for 10 years was given a cell-gene drug customized from huaxia yingtai laboratory. one month later, the evaluation showed that the patient had been basically cured. the drugs participating in this clinical study not only have "amazing" efficacy, but also demonstrate new breakthroughs in safety. it turns out that it is not customized using the patient's own cells, but is made using cells from a healthy provider. it is a universal cell therapy drug. zhao xueqiang said that currently, relevant research projects have been launched at shanghai changzheng hospital. if universal cell therapy drugs can be prepared, it will significantly reduce the cost of "sky-high-priced drugs" for cell gene therapy, and at the same time, it can also solve the problem of patients' own weakness, the pharmaceutical conundrum of poor cell quality.

yimiao shenzhou and huaxia yingtai are the epitome of beijing's future-oriented cutting-edge layout of cell and gene therapy. in this hot land where new forces are surging, innovative achievements have been implemented in multiple parks: the first domestic hospital focusing on cell and gene therapy was established in changping; geneqiming developed my country's first inkt cell that has entered the registration clinical stage. therapeutic products; yongtai biotech has become the “first stock in cellular immunotherapy” and is expected to launch the country’s first solid tumor immune cell drug eal… they are like stars dotting the innovation map of beijing, illuminating the future of cell and gene therapy industrial road.

multiple accumulation of power to accelerate future industries

in the wave of global life science and technology and industrial revolution, the biomanufacturing industry represented by synthetic biology, cell and gene therapy, etc. is becoming a popular new track for countries to compete for a position. market agencies predict that about 60% of the world's substances can be produced through synthetic biology. this year, the global market size of synthetic biology will reach 18.9 billion u.s. dollars; in terms of cell and gene therapy, it is expected that the market size will reach 305 billion u.s. dollars by 2025. billion dollars.

looking at the country, beijing, shanghai, guangdong, zhejiang and other places are accelerating the deployment of biomanufacturing industries. as the wind and tide surge, beijing continues to gather strength to accelerate the ignition of this future industry "nuclear explosion point". in may this year, the "beijing plan to accelerate collaborative innovation in medicine and health (2024-2026)" was released, which proposed the deployment of "nuclear explosion point" special projects in cutting-edge technology fields such as cell gene therapy and synthetic biology. in september this year, the "beijing action plan to accelerate the innovation and development of the synthetic biology manufacturing industry (2024-2026)" was released, with a maximum subsidy of 50 million yuan for key projects.

not only does it have favorable policies, beijing also has real industrial space and supporting service facilities. at present, the synthetic biology manufacturing and transformation acceleration center located in zhongguancun life science park, changping district is undergoing renovation and renovation. wang ying, general manager of changfa development group, told reporters that the acceleration center will be put into use by the end of the year, with a total area of ​​about 15,000 square meters. it will not only be able to it provides enterprises with office space and laboratories that can be "packed in", and also uses about one-third of the space to create three major public platforms, including a high-throughput strain screening platform.

the acceleration center has not yet been put into use, but it has already attracted phoenixes. synthetic biology company duomeikang biotech plans to establish its beijing company in the acceleration center. this is a company engaged in the synthesis of collagen raw materials and the production of collagen products such as functional skin care products and medical devices. guo zhidong, chairman of duomeikang biotech, said that the company will focus on technology research and development and medical device-related businesses this time in beijing.

expert comments

zhang guifeng, director of the biotechnology working committee of the china anti-aging promotion association:

beijing’s layout of synthetic biology manufacturing industry has innovative resource advantages

currently, the future development potential of the biomanufacturing industry has been recognized globally. what is the current development status of this industry in china? zhang guifeng, director of the biotechnology working committee of the china anti-aging promotion association, said that my country's synthetic biology has a large research volume and a large number of practitioners. it has a good industrial foundation in biological reactions, separation and purification, and product types, and has laid out many application scenarios. , but needs to be strengthened in high-end areas such as basic software, strain construction, online detection, and combination with artificial intelligence.

talking about beijing's advantages in developing this future industry, zhang guifeng analyzed that beijing's biggest advantage is its intensive innovation resources, concentration of universities and scientific research institutes, and its excellent capabilities in gene editing, bacterial strain design, and expression system construction involved in biomanufacturing. foundation, and also has strong capital advantages.

in terms of industrial positioning, he suggested that beijing focus on the research and development of upstream common technologies in biomanufacturing and pilot scale-up before industrialization, focusing on areas such as life and health, agriculture and food, beautiful economy, energy, and new materials. among them, medicine, medical equipment, beautiful economy and other related fields require little land space, are relatively friendly to the environment, and can achieve rapid transformation of results; agriculture, food, energy and other fields focus on technological research and opening up the entire technology chain. point.

super chain

biomanufacturing is an emerging production technology that uses biological processes to synthesize or process products. compared with traditional chemical or physical manufacturing methods, it is green, low-carbon, and renewable. it is an important representative of strategic emerging industries. compared with traditional chemical or physical manufacturing methods, the core difference between biomanufacturing and biomanufacturing lies in the different production principles and processes. traditional manufacturing relies on physical processing or chemical reactions, which may involve the use of high temperatures, high pressures, and harmful chemicals, while biomanufacturing relies on the molecular metabolic processes of organisms, optimizing and controlling these processes through genetic engineering and cell culture technology. this new production method can not only improve production efficiency, but also reduce waste generation, achieve a more sustainable production model, and provide a new development direction for modern industrial production.

source: beijing daily

reporters: zhao yuhan, yuan lu

process editor: u028