Welcome to the Institute of Bioprocess and Biosystems Engineering at the Hamburg University of Technology

Founded in 1986 as one of the first university research institutes in Bioprocess Engineering in Germany, IBB has a long tradition and wide expertise in bioprocess development.  Presently, more than 30 staff members, mostly at Postdoc and PhD student levels, are working in the institute in a highly interdisciplinary environment. Our research focus is on designing novel enzymes, pathways and cells and on developing integrated bioproduction systems for chemicals, fuels and pharmaceuticals from renewable materials. To this end, we develop and integrate methods and tools ranging from Systems and Synthetic Biology to combined bioconversion and product recovery in miniplant under industry-relevant conditions. Such a molecular and multiscale Biosystems Engineering approach is demonstrated to be highly efficient in developing several new bioprocesses such as for diols and amino acids.

For teaching we are actively involved in several B.Sc. and M.Sc. programs in General Engineering Science, Process Engineering and Bioprocess Engineering. Following the German tradition in training engineers we emphasize a solid engineering understanding and practical handling. Furthermore, we train a new generation of engineers with a deep quantitative and systemic understanding of cellular and bio-molecular processes.