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JOSÉ MARÍA SÁNCHEZ MONTERO AN. R. ACAD. NAC. FARM.

contrando un amplio campo de acción en la Industria Farmacéutica. Los procesos
biotecnológicos, por su elevada eficiencia y especificidad, cuentan entre sus pro-
piedades más características el que generan unos menores niveles de residuos que
los procesos químicos convencionales y, además, esos residuos son comparativa-
mente mucho menos peligrosos.

Palabras clave: Biotransformaciones.—Estabilización.—Disolventes orgáni-
cos.—Síntesis de fármacos.—Química verde.

SUMMARY

White Biotechnology and Pharmaceutical Industry

White Biotechnology is related to the utilization of biological systems for the
manufacture, transformation or degradation of molecules using enzymatic and
fermentative processes. This definition fits the biocatalytic processes and the
biotransformations in the huge set of disciplines and sciences that have been
defined as Biotechnology.

The stabilization of enzymes and cells for increasing their resistance towards
the organic solvents by immobilization and modification techniques, as well as
using genetic engineering, has supposed a significant impulse. On the other hand,
the knowledge of the reaction media and the control of the variables affecting the
process has supposed a real technological transformation. Industrial Biotechnology
has become an important tool for obtaining drugs (and other bioproducts) which
are difficult or impossible to obtain by chemical traditional methods.

At the present, more than 325 million people in the world use drugs with a
biotechnological origin, so it can be deduced that the application of the
Biotechnology (and specially Biocatalysis) has crossed the academic border finding
a wide range of utilities in the pharmaceutical Industry. The biotechnological
processes, due to their high efficiency and specificity, generate reduced levels of
residues when compared to chemical conventional processes which on the other
hand, are comparatively more dangerous.

Key words: Biotransformations.—Stabilization.—Organic solvents.—Drugs
synthesis.—Green chemistry.

INTRODUCCIÓN

El interés que ha despertado la Biotecnología en estos últimos
años se ha traducido, entre otras cosas, en una proliferación de
definiciones consecuencia directa de su observación desde diferentes
enfoques, que tienen en común el empleo de seres vivos, sus proce-

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