2019

Rapid Mammalian Cell Harvest Without Centrifugation for Antibody Purification: Using a Novel System for Cell Culture Media Clarification

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Monoclonal antibody (MAb) expression systems typically use signal peptides to ensure secretion of antibodies into cell culture media. Although that reduces the complexity of purification and prevents the need for cell disruption, it does require using expensive and time-consuming techniques to separate cells from antibody-containing cell culture fluids. In this study, we describe our tests of the novel Sartoclear Dynamics Lab V system (Sartorius S Lab Instruments GmbH and Co. KG) for rapid clarification of cell culture media without requiring…

October 21, 2019

Special Report: Current Analytical Approaches to Biophysical Characterization in a Regulatory Environment

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Structural integrity of protein-based therapeutics is one of the major challenges in the biopharmaceutical industry. Multiple factors such as product stability, efficacy, and shelf life could be affected following minor changes in manufacturing process. Multiple biophysical methods employing spectroscopic and calorimetric tools can be used to analyse Higher Order Structure (HOS). Moreover, with an increasing demand for generating as much structural information as possible for regulatory submissions, a requirement for these analyses in a GMP environment is also important. This…

October 21, 2019

Technology Highlights from the 2019 BioProcess International Conference

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This year’s BioProcess International Conference and Exhibition, held 9–12 September 2019, hosted nearly 200 exhibitors showcasing technical innovations for the biopharmaceutical industry. This year’s conference sessions also included daily technical workshops detailing supplier solutions and technologies. Below are some notable technologies featured that demonstrate the industry’s dedication to finding new ways to help manufacturers shorten time to market. Most systems offer the benefits of single use, integration, process control, economies of scale, automation, and closed-system processing. Upstream Production The exhibit…

October 21, 2019

Smart Sensors and Data Management Solutions for Modern Facilities

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Bioprocess manufacturers continue to seek technologies for increasing productivity and shortening timelines from discovery to commercialization. Innovations such as high-throughput systems, automated platforms, and the latest clarification systems all have made processes efficient and robust. And with the increasing adoption of quality by design (QbD) principles, including the use of process analytical technologies (PAT), biomanufacturers are mitigating the risks of errors in their operations better than ever before. A critical part of mitigating risk is gathering meaningful process data and…

October 21, 2019

Rapid Implementation of Novel Affinity Purification: Manufacture of Commercial-Scale Next-Generation Antibody Therapies

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The rapid and cost-effective production of conventional monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) for clinical trials and commercial supply has contributed toward their wide adoption. Production processes have become more efficient because common purification processes are being used across structurally similar MAbs during key steps of process development and manufacturing. Such successful platform approaches can remove unwanted impurities and are stable across processing conditions, irrespective of the MAb being purified. In addition, they are readily available at the required volume to support large-scale…

October 21, 2019

CMC Development Platforms and Outsourcing to Reduce Timelines

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Forty Seven is a company developing novel therapies based on anti-CD47 and other immuno-oncologies. CD47 is called the “don’t eat me†signal that cancer cells give out to escape elimination by the body’s immune system. Qinghai Zhao, vice president of technical development and manufacturing, is one of the scientists working on the company’s magrolimab (5F9) monoclonal antibody that is designed to block the binding of the CD47 signal to the cell receptor SIRP-α while boosting the “eat me†signal that…

October 21, 2019

eBook: Bioreactor Scale-Up: From Pilot to Commercial Scale in the Modern Era

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Upstream bioproduction always has begun with laboratory systems producing limited amounts of product for test purposes, then those bioprocesses are scaled up to make more product more efficiently for larger clinical trials — and ultimately commercial distribution. With the advent of single-use technology and continuous processing, how have scale-up approaches changed in recent years, specifically at the pilot-to-production level? In this online exclusive, BPI editors review the science and technology affecting decisions made at this stage of process development, with…

September 27, 2019

Introduction: Reporting from the Frontiers of Cell Line Engineering at BPI Europe and BPI West

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Every biomanufacturing process begins with transfection of recombinant genes into pools of cells — followed by a succession of screenings from which will emerge (ideally) a single progenitor cell of the new production cell line. Cast aside will be those cells that do not uptake the correct genetic material, those incapable of thriving in bioprocess conditions, those that fail to produce recombinant protein at relevant levels, and those without demonstrated clonality and relative genetic stability. Over the past several years,…

September 26, 2019

Creating Novel Cell Lines By Genome Editing: Simplifying Cell-Based Assays and Improving Production of Biomolecules

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Cultured cell lines have a diverse range of applications. They are used broadly by cell biologists, clinicians, tissue engineers, biotechnology scientists, and bioengineers. The most important uses of cell culture are in the cell-based assays and production of biologically active recombinant proteins. In recent years, genome editing has been used widely to study the structure, function, and localization of endogenous proteins in cultured cells. However, applying the same genome editing techniques to cell lines also could improve the propagation of…

September 26, 2019

Streamlined Serum-Free Adaptation of CHO-DG44 Cells: Using a Novel Chemically Defined Medium

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Monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) have radically transformed the treatment of many chronic diseases, mainly in the fields of oncology and autoimmunity. The overwhelming majority of therapeutic MAbs are manufactured from recombinant Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cell lines. The original CHO cell line was isolated in the 1950s, and since the early 1980s, it has become the workhorse of the biopharmaceutical industry. The CHO-DG44 strain was generated after several rounds of mutagenesis that deleted both copies of dihydrofolate reductase (dhfr) genes by…

September 26, 2019