Media formulation optimization: current and future opportunities

Chemically defined cell culture media is a complex mixture of molecules used for cellular metabolism and growth. Decisions surrounding which molecules to include in a formulation and their optimal concentration is a major endeavor in biomanufacturing. Cellular metabolic complexity and stringent quality requirements that vary across cell lines require time-consuming, iterative experimentation to optimize media formulation. Exacerbating this is the orders-of-magnitude concentration differences among media components making media characterization difficult. This review describes the challenges, advances and strategies currently used to optimize media formulations as well as future opportunities for improvement.