IntelliCyt eBook - October 2017 - 6

Development & Optimization: The Dynamic Duo of Biomanufacturing * Cell-Line Development Poised for Growth

due to limitations of existing optimization technologies and a demanding regulatory climate.

Improving CHO Cells
"The recent productivity gains are mainly due to
optimization of media, feed, and processes plus
improved expression vector and selection workflows," comments Daniel Ivansson, staff research
engineer, GE Healthcare. He adds that GE Healthcare intends to bring about future productivity
gains through the "engineering and design of
the cell itself." The company is emphasizing the
development of CHO starter cells with enhanced
phenotypes.

The Austrian Centre of Industrial
Biotechnology and GE Healthcare are
introducing a cell-line engineering research
collaboration to bring increased productivity
to biomanufacturers. The goal of the threeyear partnership is to explore and identify
new tools and methods to modify and
optimize CHO cell-line performance.
6

| GENengnews.com

Current optimization methods involve
empirical, trial-and-error methods for selecting
clones from suboptimal starter cell lines. Modern
gene-editing and analysis tools have changed
the picture to the point where more detailed
characterization of cell performance is possible
with improved starting cells. Transcriptomics, in
particular, provides insights into the regulation
of cellular performance.

"Among the tools we will employ are highthroughput formats for assessing product secretion and cellular growth of desired phenotypes,"
Ivansson details. "We will also use RNA-seq, global
epigenetic analysis, genome sequencing, and
metabolomics to characterize phenotypes. We
will also use proteomics as needed."

Difficult Proteins
Early in 2017, Selexis announced that it was
applying its SUREtechnology Platform™ to cell
lines for three Sanofi biotherapeutics: a "naked"
antibody, a bispecific antibody, and a complex
recombinant vaccine.
Selexis CEO Igor Fisch, Ph.D., explains how one
platform cell-improvement technology can serve
the production of such disparate products. He
begins by noting that generating clinically and
commercially viable therapeutic proteins involves
well-known transfection, transcription, translation, and transport of products via the cell's
secretion pathways, whereby it is folded,
modified, and secreted into the media.

http://www.GENengnews.com

IntelliCyt eBook - October 2017

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