One of the first DTU students to go on an exchange stay at NC State is Daniel Nymand Petersen, who has studied fermentation-based bioproduction at DTU. Earlier this year, he completed his Master’s thesis in fermentation-based production and purification of blood protein using cellulose membranes. This took place at NC State with John Woodley and Professor Ruben Carbonell from NC State as supervisors. Today, Daniel Nymand Petersen is employed at Novo Nordisk.
“NC State is a leader in its field in, for example, purification with membranes, so it was an obvious choice for me to apply for the AIM-Bio programme, where I gained hands-on experience with purification of proteins. At NC State, I worked in the laboratory and conducted experiments that I had only read about at DTU. It gave me a unique opportunity to learn about a state-of-the-art research area that is seeing constant and rapid development, both in Denmark and internationally,” says Daniel Nymand Petersen.
As an engineer, he wants to make a difference in the world. And there are several benefits in working with fermentation-based bioproduction, which can be used to produce medicine using living organisms, says Daniel Nymand Petersen:
“Fermentation can play an important role in the transition from oil-based production of chemicals to more sustainable and bio-based production. And it’s exciting to develop a purification technique with membranes. It looks like this could be the next step in purification. Where this technology used to be a theoretical concept, we’re now starting to come up with good solutions with great potential.”
