15/05/09 The Biomine division of Upfront Chromatography A/S, the world’s leading developer of customised industrial-scale separation technologies, introduces the Rhobust Whey Refinery – a new cost-effective, large-scale chromatography platform for optimal purification of high-value protein products from whey. This state-of-the-art separation system combines Upfront’s proprietary EBA (Expanded Bed Adsorption) chromatography platform with already available, advanced membrane filtration techniques. With only minimal water consumption, this flexible, sustainable and cost-efficient process extracts highly functional, quality protein products.

The Rhobust Whey Refinery is capable of purifying multiple protein products from crude whey in a single, flexible process, thereby meeting the demands of a diverse range of customers. The flexibility of the Rhobust Whey Refinery platform enables it to be linked to existing membrane-based WPC (Whey Protein Concentrates) plants. The following products are currently purified by the Rhobust Whey Refinery: WPI (Whey Protein Isolates) +95 %; high purity α-lactalbumin and α-lactalbumin enriched WPI; β-lactoglobulin, depleted WPI; β-lactoglobulin +95 %; Immunoglobulin enriched WPI; GMP and Lactoferrin. All protein products have improved functionality for food ingredient usage, whilst the gentle EBA purification process conserves the biological activity of protein intended for nutraceutical applications. The protein products are largely free of lipids, carbohydrates and minerals and have a neutral taste profile.

“The Rhobust Whey Refinery platform provides the lowest cost route for production of highly purified and differentiated food ingredient products with multiple functionalities,” says Allan Lihme, Technical Director of Upfront. 

The β-Lactoglobulin enriched products are highly water soluble and have excellent functional properties e.g. for use in gelation. α-Lactoalbumin is a protein of high interest as a supplement for infant formulas as it mimics natural human breast milk, which is high in α-Lactoalbumin and contains no β-Lactoglobulin. Whey immunoglobulins, lactoferrin and lactoperoxidase are bioactive health-promoting ingredients that are well known enhancers of the immune defence system.

The combination of Upfront’s Rhobust EBA unit with advanced membrane techniques enables industrial utilisation of adsorption chromatography and the EBA format enables direct adsorption from crude feed stocks without prior clarification or concentration steps. Rhobust? has been used on the industrial scale level for protein fractionation and is proven to be a sustainable production platform with minimal water and chemical usage.