A UK biotechnology start-up, founded in 2023, that uses microgravity on the International Space Station to make drug crystals for treatments patients could one day inject themselves.
BioOrbit is a UK company working on making medicines in space. It is building what it calls the world's first contract development and manufacturing organisation dedicated to in-space drug manufacturing. Its platform crystallises biologic drugs, which are medicines made from living cells, in microgravity. On Earth, many such drugs are given by slow intravenous infusion in hospital. BioOrbit wants to create high-concentration, low-viscosity formulations that can be given as a quick injection under the skin, which could make treatments faster, less invasive and easier to get.
The company was founded in 2023. Its founders are Dr Katie King, who is chief executive, and Dr Leonor Teles, an oncology researcher. Its mission, in its own words on the UK Space industry listing, is to create these formulations; its first target is cancer treatment, where the aim is for patients to take medicines at home. Dr King said a launch in May "marks the beginning of a new era in how medicines can be manufactured". Longer term, the company says it wants a space-based pharmaceutical manufacturing facility within a decade. Its estimate that the method could greatly cut drug administration costs is a company claim.
BioOrbit is UK-based, and its membership of the UK Space industry body lists it as a UK company, but the pages we read do not give a town or address, so we cannot say where its offices or labs are. It has been supported by ESA BIC UK, the European Space Agency's incubator run by the Science and Technology Facilities Council, which has sites at Harwell, Daresbury, Edinburgh and Leicester. Its Baby BOX-E payload launched on a SpaceX flight from NASA's Kennedy Space Center and spent about six weeks in orbit, forming uniform protein crystals. The company described it as the largest production of protein crystals in space to date.
Culture and team details are thin. The sources describe a young science-led company and do not describe working life, so we have not invented any. What they show is a team that combines oncology, pharmaceutical science and space engineering, working with spaceflight partners, the incubator and UK public bodies, and a company in which people who like chemistry and biology can see their work go to orbit.
The roles at a start-up like this are likely to include biologists and chemists who develop and test the crystals, engineers who design hardware that survives launch and works in orbit, quality and regulatory staff who make sure medicines are safe, and operations and business people who work with space and pharmaceutical partners. If you enjoy biology or chemistry and are curious about space, this shows how the two meet. Check the BioOrbit website for current roles.
Website: www.ukspace.org/sme-member/bioorbit
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