Embodiments provide a distributed bioreactor system in which a plurality of modular bioreactors are operated in parallel to produce and maintain a biological cell culture. A central or nurse perfusion bioreactor produces and maintains a cell culture and transfers portions of the cell culture to a plurality of modular peripheral perfusion bioreactors, each of which produces and maintains the cell culture in turn. In order to prevent contamination and facilitate segregation of particular peripheral bioreactors, the distributed system is configured such that one-way fluid communication is established from the central/nurse bioreactor to each of the peripheral bioreactors while maintaining fluid isolation among the peripheral bioreactors. Each modular peripheral bioreactor unit has a plug-and-play configuration and may be plugged into or otherwise coupled to the central/nurse bioreactor to scale up the overall size of the cell culture without requiring sterilization or redesign or reconfiguration of the system.