UMBC announced last week a $7.9 million contract with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop technology that would dramatically reduce the time and space needed to manufacture biologics, such as insulin, and make them more accessible in the field. “This project,” says Govind Rao, the principal investigator and director of UMBC’s Center for Advanced Sensor Technology (CAST), “will completely revolutionize the manufacture of biologics. Today, protein based drugs, which are used in the treatment of diabetes, cancer, and rheumatoid arthritis, among others, are made using cells suspended in large, stationary, tanks of several hundred liters or more …