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ONDERZOEK IN DE KIJKER
INDUSTRY OR ACADEMIA?
THE ANSWER IS BOTH
Every year, Flanders Innovation & Entrepreneurship (VLAIO- Vlaams
Agentschap Innoveren en Ondernemen) provides funding for doctoral and postdoctoral
research in close collaboration with a Flemish company. In 2019, thirty
Baekeland-mandates (PhD) were submitted in collaboration with an academic
promotor from KU Leuven. Nineteen projects were approved amounting to a
success rate of 63%. We caught up with André Carlos Munoz Lopez (Ghent
Technology Campus), current Baekeland mandate –holder.
Could you introduce your research project?
After an initial pre-doctoral phase at the KU Leuven research
group, BioTeC+, I am now in my second year of PhD supported
by a Baekeland mandate from VLAIO. The project plan was
developed during that pre-doctoral phase and successfully
defended in front of a mixed academia-industry jury. The scope
of my research falls within the framework of Industry 4.0. It aims
at developing novel methods for data-driven modelling, control,
and optimization of chemical production processes. I use data that
is continuously generated at the production sites of Janssen
Pharmaceutica (Johnson & Johnson) to construct mathematical
models for a better understanding, controlling and optimizing their
processes. My PhD research contributes to a more efficient
production of medicines to meet the volumes required for the
patients but also, and more importantly, to the quality standards
of those medicines.
What was your motivation to collaborate with a company?
As a student finishing my studies in chemical engineering, I was
intrigued by science and research. Having the opportunity to
contribute to novel ideas and developments to the understanding
of a given phenomenon, and building new possibilities to exploit
that understanding to improve human life, is something that
attracts many young students. But as a rather practical person,
with a strong feeling for engineering, I was also aware that
transformations do not occur from one moment to the next by
themselves. Someone needs to put the effort in bringing powerful
ideas and technologies to practice in order to demonstrate their
benefits and limitations in the real world. I am quite sure that
many others before and after me, had and will face the same
question: Industry or Academia? Well, with this Baekeland
mandate, the answer is both.
Which type of work do you perform at which location?
What I love about the Baekeland formula is that, today, I share an
office with my colleagues from KU Leuven –BioTeC+: an
internationally recognized research group at Ghent Technology
Campus, founded by Professor Jan Van Impe and with over 25
years of research experience in model-based design, monitoring,
optimization, and control of (bio)chemical conversion processes.
Tomorrow, I will sit at my desk at Janssen Pharmaceutica, the
largest pharmaceutical company in Belgium. With my colleagues at
the university, I have the opportunity to discuss fundamental topics
related to process modelling, monitoring and optimisation, while
with my colleagues from industry I contribute to the continuous
improvement of production processes to bring medicines to the
patients.
What will be the tangible outcomes from your research?
Towards the end of my PhD, my goal is to have developed novel
and broadly applicable approaches for data-driven modelling of
(bio) chemical production processes. These will have been validated
directly on the production of medicines and will have resulted in
significant improvements that guarantee meeting the stringent
quality standards. Meanwhile, I have already obtained significant
progress in this direction. For example, I have developed a new
method to train tensor-based models that result in more informative
models that allow a more robust identification and factorization of
the system variability. The more interpretable data-driven models
help engineers to identify the root cause for deviations, monitor the
processes and offers the opportunity for continuous improvement
of these processes. The application of this methodology to a largescale
spray-drying unit used in the commercial production of an
Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient has resulted in a benefit to
Janssen Pharmaceutical in fault identification and quality prediction.
Similar applications in other production lines are currently ongoing,
with objectives such as process optimisation and real time release.
Iason Passaris
www.vlaio.be/nl/subsidies-financiering/
baekeland-mandaten
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