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Prof Suzy Farid Wins Gaden Award for Pioneering Research on Continuous Bioprocessing
1 April 2025
Professor Suzanne (Suzy) Farid, Head of UCL Biochemical Engineering, has been awarded the 2025 Elmer Gaden Award by the journal Biotechnology & Bioengineering (B&B), in recognition of her innovative research on the economic potential of continuous bioprocessing.
Suzy Farid receiving the Gaden Award plaque from ACS BIOT Awards Chair, Professor Brian Pfleger, at ACS 2025
Suzy received the award at the ACS BIOT conference in San Diego in March 2025, where she delivered the Gaden Award Lecture on evaluating strategic innovations in biomanufacturing.
The award recognises her high-impact paper titled: “End-to-end continuous bioprocessing: Impact on facility design, cost of goods, and cost of development for monoclonal antibodies” (B&B, Vol. 118, Issue 9, 2021), co-authored with Hanna Mahal (UCL) and Harvey Branton (formerly CPI). The paper presents a decisional tool to guide manufacturers in weighing the costs and benefits of adopting continuous bioprocessing over conventional batch approaches.
Named in honour of Elmer Gaden, widely recognised as the father of biochemical engineering, the Gaden Award is presented annually for a single publication in Biotechnology & Bioengineering that reflects exceptional innovation, creativity, and originality.
This year’s award carries special resonance for UCL. The journal Biotechnology & Bioengineering was co-founded in 1959 by Elmer Gaden (Columbia University), Maxwell Donald (UCL Chemical Engineering) and Eric Crook (UCL Biochemistry). These visionaries helped define biochemical engineering as a discipline in its own right. Their legacy continues through this award-winning work, which combines engineering, biology, and economics to support better decision-making in biotherapeutic manufacture.
Suzy commented:
“It’s an incredible honour to receive the Gaden Award, especially knowing the deep UCL roots of the journal. Continuous bioprocessing offers exciting potential, but real-world implementation needs robust, strategic analysis. I’m proud this work is helping shape that conversation. This paper reflects the hard work and dedication of the doctoral researcher, Hanna Mahal. My thanks go to Hanna, Harvey, our industry collaborators and all our decisional tools researchers for their invaluable input throughout this journey.”
The award-winning research has not only influenced industrial adoption of continuous bioprocessing but has also shaped global policy. It was cited in the UK Cabinet Office’s “100 Days Mission” report on pandemic preparedness and in the Gates Foundation white paper advocating for “Innovations for Exceptionally Low-Cost Monoclonal Antibody (mAb) Manufacturing”. Hanna’s early presentation of the work was also selected for the ACS Best of BIOT collection, highlighting its broad impact across the field.
This recognition marks another milestone in UCL Biochemical Engineering’s ongoing leadership in shaping the future of cost-effective and sustainable manufacture of biological medicines.
Find out more
- Read Suzy Farid's Award-winning paper "End-to-end continuous bioprocessing: Impact on facility design, cost of goods, and cost of development for monoclonal antibodies."
- Professor Suzy Farid’s UCL Research Profile.
- UCL Decisional Tools.