EBA installation at Dairy Farmers, Australia

Brief

Dairy Farmers is one of Australia's largest Dairy Manufacturers. The Company approached Upfront in order to develop two sanitary processes for the isolation of functional proteins from cheese whey for use in food and healthcare. The first process was designed to isolate Lactoferrin (LF) and Lactoperoxidase (LP) and a second for Immunoglobulin (IgG). The platform developed can process more than 200,000 litres of cheese whey per day and is the world's largest expanded bed adsorption system.

Objectives

• To develop a novel, high-speed process for capture of LF, LP and IgG from cheese whey
• Meet customer goals for yield, activity and purity of these functional proteins, within defined economic targets
• To transfer the technology to Dairy Farmers site in Australia to facilitate full-scale production

Methods

• A Feasibility Study was performed to identify suitable adsorbents from Upfront's extensive in-house mixed mode adsorbent library for selective capture of LF, LP and IgG from cheese whey
• A pilot study was initiated with Upfront's Process Supervisors on-site to train Dairy Farmers personnel
• Following successful completion of the pilot study, production-scale columns were designed and built to integrate easily into Dairy Farmers existing plant

Result

• Successful development of a fast, efficient and economical isolation process for functional LF, LP and IgG proteins
• Development of the world's largest EBA installation, processing 15,000 litres of cheese whey per hour
• LF purity of >90% and IgG purity of >80% was achieved
• Isolation of different grades of IgG was made possible by control of various process parameters, facilitating a range of new ingredient / functional protein opportunities and markets for the client
• Rapid, easy integration of a novel production process into the customer's existing facility
• Use of Upfront's proprietary tungsten carbide Rhobust^® adsorbent, a high-density EBA adsorbent, enabled very high flow-rates to be achieved, significantly increasing productivity compared to conventional packed bed installations
• Dairy Farmers and Upfront entered into a license and supply agreement; Upfront has successfully supplied adsorbent and on-going technical support, as required, since 2002

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