Biomineralization Scale-Up: From Flask to Field
From lab concept to industrial scale and real-world deployment, Alagene advanced a novel microbial biomineralization technology from shake flasks to an industrial fermenter, and successfully put it to the test across controlled field trials in real soil.
Why Bio-Mineralization
Microbially induced calcite precipitation uses naturally occurring bacteria to bind soil and sand particles together, forming a cement-like material without the energy use and carbon footprint of traditional cement. It's a biological route to stabilizing ground, roads, slopes and construction materials, and one Alagene is now proving can work at industrial scale.
A Structured Scale-Up Strategy
The program followed a systematic, stepwise approach designed to preserve cell viability and biocement-forming activity throughout scale-up.
Shake-flask studies first established biocement formation and evaluated performance across a range of application-relevant conditions, including the use of seawater as the mineral suspension medium. These findings guided the development and optimization of a robust fermentation process supporting high cell viability, strong biomass production, and consistent biomineralization activity.
The process was progressively transferred from 2 L fermentation runs to 20 L production, generating sufficient material for field trials, before advancing to a 100 L industrial fermenter. This demonstrated successful transfer to a production-relevant scale and enabled Alagene to establish a full-scale-ready protocol capturing the critical parameters required for future industrial production runs.
From the Fermenter to the Field
Laboratory performance was only part of the challenge. Alagene took the scaled microbial culture and mineralization solution into the field, where the materials were prepared and applied on-site across a structured grid of real-soil test plots.
Different combinations of key application parameters were systematically tested, enabling the team to assess their effect on biocement formation and identify the conditions delivering the strongest performance under real-world environmental conditions.
What This Demonstrates
This project demonstrates Alagene’s ability to integrate microbial process development, fermentation scale-up, production transfer, field-trial design, and application optimization within a single end-to-end program.
By connecting laboratory development with production-relevant fermentation and real-world deployment, Alagene created a practical pathway for advancing microbial biomineralization technologies toward full-scale implementation.
