Coralville, IA – The Center for Biocatalysis and Bioprocessing (CBB) at the University of Iowa, in partnership with Cellular Engineering Technologies (CET), is proud to announce the successful award of a grant targeting the development of a robust biomanufacturing workflow for the commercial production of high-valued growth factor proteins. This funding represents a major milestone in advancing CET’s proprietary humanized yeast expression platform for the commercial production of recombinant growth factors. This novel approach is designed to enhance the bioactivity, stability, and cost-effectiveness of growth factors in life science research and bioprocessing applications. This grant is awarded by the Iowa State University Biobased Products Innovation Ecosystem through economic development funding from the Iowa Legislature. 

By leveraging the CBB’s 20+ years of process development and scale-up experience, CET’s protein expression workflow will be scaled to commercial-grade levels. This collaboration will accelerate the commercialization of next-generation growth factors that address critical limitations with existing growth factors, including short half-life, low bioreactivity, and high production costs associated with traditional E. coli and CHO cell expression systems.

“We are excited to receive this grant, which validates the transformative potential of our humanized yeast expression platform,” said Marc Centrella, CEO of CET. “This funding allows us to bridge the gap between research and large-scale production, ensuring that our sustainable, high-performance growth factors become widely accessible to researchers and commercial therapeutic developers.”

“The CBB looks forward to applying our scale-up and biomanufacturing expertise toward establishing a commercially viable biomanufacturing process for CET’s growth factor proteins,” said Mark Arnold, the director of the CBB. “This initial platform will be developed with an eye toward the future production of these proteins under cGMP conditions.” 

With an addressable market exceeding $750 million and growing rapidly, CET’s next-generation growth factors have the potential to disrupt the industry and significantly reduce experimental costs for researchers while enhancing the efficiency of cell-based therapies and biologics production. This funding marks a crucial step in CET’s long-term vision to redefine biomanufacturing with more efficient, scalable, and sustainable solutions, reinforcing Iowa’s position as a hub for cutting-edge biotech innovation.

Both the CBB and CET anticipate that the proposed biomanufacturing breakthroughs and enhanced quality growth factor proteins will drive future biotech job creation, with a large-scale cGMP manufacturing expansion planned for 2026.

For more information, please contact:

Center for Biocatalysis and Bioprocessing: biocatalysis@uiowa.edu

Cellular Engineering Technologies: info@cet.bio

About Cellular Engineering Technologies (CET)

Cellular Engineering Technologies (CET) is a biotechnology company dedicated to advancing life science research and therapeutic development through innovative cell-based technologies. With a focus on sustainable and high-performance biomanufacturing, CET is pioneering next-generation growth factor production using proprietary engineered yeast expression systems.