Reimagining Cellular and Cell-Free Biomanufacturing Platforms in the AI Era

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Exploratory Domains

The goal of the event is to collectively develop strategic visions for high-impact, high-reward, pre-competitive engineering research-led opportunities that will advance the United States’ competitiveness and prosperity.

The event outcomes will inform future research directions and attract resources across the nation in industry, academia, federal agencies, national labs, and other stakeholders.

THEME OVERVIEW

As the biotechnology era advances, reimagining strategies for cellular and cell-free biomanufacturing is essential to sustaining U.S. leadership and competitiveness. The field sits at a critical juncture where progress in biomedical research, synthetic biology, computation, artificial intelligence, and manufacturing must converge to move beyond incremental advances. At stake is the ability to design and produce biological systems with precision, efficiency, and scale.

The aim of this visioning event is to bridge the gap between today’s fragmented approaches and a future where AI-enabled biomanufacturing platforms can transform how we design, test, and produce biological systems. Just as other industries have broken free from laborious empirical cycles, biomanufacturing must do the same by tackling challenges in predictive design, standardization, and scalability.

Agenda Highlights

This event will focus on three thematic areas where engineering can unlock transformational impact:

AI-Driven Design Platforms: How can we generate the high-quality data and network models needed to fuel digital twins and predictive design for enzymes, pathways, therapies, and more?

Manufacturing at Scale: What new approaches to resilient supply chains and distributed manufacturing will broaden access to bio-based products?

Cell-Free Bioproduction: How can advances in cell-free systems boost performance by orders of magnitude and enable human-directed biological manufacturing?