Nonlinear model predictive control of fed-batch cultures of E. coli: performance and robustness analysis

This work addresses the control of a lab-scale fed-batch culture of Escherichia coli with a nonlinear model predictive controller (NMPC) to determine the optimal feed flow rate of substrate. The objective function is formulated in terms of the kinetics of the main metabolic pathways, and aims at maximizing glucose oxidation, while minimizing glucose fermentation. As bioprocess models are usually uncertain, a robust formulation of the NMPC scheme is proposed using monotonicity arguments and a min-max optimization problem. The potentials of this approach are demonstrated in simulation using a Monte-Carlo analysis.