Image analyses for engineering advanced tissue biomanufacturing processes

Abstract

Industrial cell culture processes are inherently expensive, time-consuming, and variable. These limitations have become a critical bottleneck for the industrial translation of human cell and tissue biomanufacturing, as few human cell culture products deliver sufficient benefit, value, and consistency to offset their high manufacturing costs and produce useful clinical or biomedical solutions. Recent advances in biomedical image analysis and computational modelling can enhance the design and operation of high-efficiency tissue biomanufacturing platforms, as well as the high-content characterisation and monitoring of culture performance, to enable bioprocess control, optimisation, and automation. These computational technologies aim to maximize culture outcomes while minimizing variability and process development expense. In this review, we outline current resources and approaches which harness biomedical imaging and image-based computational models to design and operate efficient and robust human tissue biomanufacturing platforms.

Keywords: Biomanufacturing; Bioprocess engineering; Bioreactors; Computational biology; Image analysis.