Animal cell bioreactors — recent advances and challenges to scale‐up

The demand for animal cell derived products has stimulated the development of bioreactors in the last decade. Most of those developments allow a higher cell concentration to be achieved in the bioreactor than in the past, primarily by means of the continuous flow of culture medium and a mechanism of cell retention. The advantages and technological challenges of some of these developments are discussed. Lagging behind the bioreactor developments is the strategy for culture operation and optimization. The need for suitable kinetic models to describe animal cell growth is emphasized.