Imagine a capsule soaring 200 miles above Earth. While the capsule would be big enough to carry a medium-sized dog (nuzzled into itself and sleeping), there is no sign of life onboard. Instead, this capsule carries an automated laboratory specifically developed for the manufacture of pharmaceuticals. This vision is the one of Varda Space Industries.
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In this episode, Mark Herbert, VP of Biopharma Business Development at Varda, explains that a future where drugs are manufactured in space at scale is possible. Yet, two major questions arise for this endeavor: 1. What makes manufacturing in microgravity so special for this application? and 2. Does pharmaceutical manufacturing in this way make any sense economically?
While sending a payload into space is considered an expensive enterprise, the price/kilogram has recently started to come down. Pharmaceuticals can be extremely valuable on a gram-per-gram basis, so at some point, making a profit is likely.
What makes microgravity so special can be explained by the fact that there is no convection in the vacuum of space. That, in turn, impacts crystal formation. Experiments conducted on the ISS (International Space Station) with Merck’s cancer immunotherapy, pembrolizumab (Keytruda), demonstrated a more uniform particle size distribution and limited viscosity. This influences drug delivery methods when administering medicines to patients.
The science behind this proposal is extremely innovative, but how to coordinate such an ambitious project soon becomes an obvious question. Rooted in sixty-five years of space exploration, the next generation of scientists and researchers are ready to see what they can do with new rocket technologies and the potential to work in space’s microgravity, etc.
Therefore, making such a vision a reality depends on asking the right questions, such as, what is the end goal? To bring that to fruition is the capacity to imagine and execute all the intricate phases in between.
To put all of that together demands skill, expertise, and patience, as well as the ability to convince others that it is a project worth pursuing while trying to meet the strict guidelines that surround a time-sensitive launch schedule.
Large, ambitious projects such as this are awe-inspiring, but to many in the field, they are also both essential and inevitable. This realization underscores the remarkable ability of human beings to continuously push boundaries and achieve what was once considered impossible.
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