Project description
Pharmaceuticals greener by design
The EU-funded SusPharma project plans to design safe- and sustainable-by-design chemicals for use in pharmaceuticals. Researchers will use renewable carbon as the building block of scaffolds and motifs for drug synthesis and clean synthetic methodologies for C–X bond formation. Focus will also be placed on developing new continuous purification methods and performing technoeconomic and life cycle assessment analyses to assess the impact of the proposed pharmaceutical production methods. Ultimately, researchers will develop autonomous flow platforms for drug molecule synthesis using photocatalytic and electrochemical methods.
Objective
Safe- and green-by-design are pre-market design approaches whereby the objectives of minimizing the use of hazardous chemicals, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and fostering the reuse and recycling of materials in a circular economy are built into product design. SUSPHARMA fits the European need for sustainable development in modern industry and will develop during the action greener routes to prepare molecules, such as therapeutics and diagnostics.
The breakthrough innovation will involve:
- use of renewable (bio-based) carbon for the building block of scaffolds and motifs for drug synthesis;
- cleaner synthetic methodologies for C-X bond formation (that is, C-H functionalization to obtain C-C, C-F, and C-I bond formation);
- development of new benchtop continuous purification methods, to remove impurity and recycle synthetic solvents;
- integration of digitalization methods.
- LCA and TEA assessment for sensibly reducing the impact of pharmaceutical production.
The project will thus benefit from an interdisciplinary domain, involving:
- recent advances in biomass conversion for drug synthesis;
- new developments in heterogeneous catalysis;
- cutting-edge flow chemistry technologies (including synthesis and purification);
- automation and machine learning.
To address the challenge of green and digital transition and proper supply of health technologies and products, SUSPHARMA will focus on research and innovation activities that aim at integrating five breakthrough concepts: CAT-to-PHARMA, WASTE-to-PHARMA, FLOW-to-PHARMA, PUR-to-PHARMA, and DIGITAL to PHARMA. This will deliver results that are directed to pharmaceutical industries, researchers, and innovators, prompting them to develop and produce greener pharmaceuticals that are either greener by design, intrinsically less harmful for the environment, or use greener and economically more sustainable manufacturing processes and technologies.
Fields of science
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Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
HORIZON-RIA - HORIZON Research and Innovation ActionsCoordinator
70121 Bari
Italy