A partnership between Imperial and global chemical company BASF aims to roll out new technologies to improve the performance of the chemical industry.
Since 2019, the partners have been researching ways to produce chemicals with less energy and materials, deploy continuous production techniques at smaller scales, and use AI to optimise manufacturing.
They are now intensifying efforts to turn their research findings into technologies that are ready for adoption and to roll them out, a report published today reveals.
While the joint research by Imperial and BASF is academically pioneering, with papers in prestigious venues such as the AI conference NeurIPS, it is also focused on helping the chemical industry address real-world challenges.
These include meeting sustainability commitments, improving resilience to supply shocks caused by geopolitical events, and being ready potentially to manufacture new pandemic-beating pharmaceuticals at speed.
With the necessary investment, the innovations under development also have potential to help create new economic opportunities in the UK such as new manufacturing facilities and high-skilled employment.
Universities, businesses and government
The work has been supported by UK government through the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and other organisations in a programme known as Innovative Continuous Manufacturing for Industrial Chemicals (IConIC) that also includes partners Almac, AM Technology, CPI, METTLER TOLEDO Autochem, Siemens, SOLVE Chemistry and Sterling Pharma Solutions.
In a foreword to the new report into the Imperial-BASF partnership, Dr Alice Glättli, Senior Vice President (Digitalization, Automation, and Innovation Management) at BASF, writes: "External collaboration and open innovation with strategic partners like Imperial and industrial partners along the value chain is an important strategic lever … Imperial has become one of BASF's most important academic partners due to its translation-driven mindset, its interdisciplinary research and excellent digital capabilities."
Three routes from lab to market
To bring new techniques and technologies to adoption, the partners are applying a three-pronged approach.
Where possible, BASF is looking to directly adopt solutions that can help it to improve its manufacturing processes or bring new products to market. For example, the company is currently working toward implementing a new technique that uses light instead of heat to set off the chemical reactions needed to produce products such as crop protections chemicals.
In some cases, Imperial and BASF are working with companies who can use the solutions in different markets. For example, a technique for more efficiently producing a type of molecule often used in pharmaceuticals is under development in partnership with Almac Sciences, a UK pharmaceutical contract development and manufacturing organisation.
And in a third route to market, the partners have jointly launched a startup company, SOLVE Chemistry, which is now working independently to provide the whole industry with access to its hardware and AI-based solutions for more rapidly finding the best way to manufacture a chemical.
Future plans
As the partnership evolves, Imperial is now working with BASF's support to explore further ambitions such as new facilities on campuses that could help companies to test and de-risk investments in new kinds of chemical manufacturing.
Professor Mary Ryan, Vice Provost (Research and Enterprise) at Imperial, also writing in the new report, says: "Using Imperial's advanced expertise in chemicals and digital technologies, the technical advances we now have in the pipeline with BASF are both highly realistic and deliverable and potentially transformational, opening up opportunities for dramatic increases in efficiency and even new value chains. Looking to the future, we're excited to be working with BASF on new developments that could extend our partnership and further accelerate innovation in industrial chemistry."
A complete guide to the partnership
A new report offers an accessible guide to the innovations in industrial chemistry under development by Imperial and BASF, and future opportunities for the chemical industry in the UK and around the world. View it here:
Advancing the chemical industry: A report on the Imperial College London-BASF partnership
