Evaluation of safety and quality impact of extractable and leachable substances in therapeutic biologic protein products: a risk-based perspective

Drug-Leachable Interaction Product Evaluation in Prefilled Syringe of Ganirelix Acetate Injection

The concept of extractables and leachable has introduced a new era for identifying potential impurities in drug products. Pharmaceutical packaging materials encompass a variety of polymers due to their appealing properties for storing the drug product. However, numerous chemical species may leach into the drug product from these polymers, posing significant health hazards in the public domain. Identifying such leachable is crucial for assessing safety and addressing toxicological concerns. Acrylic acids are commonly used materials for adhering needles to the barrel in pre-filled syringes. In this study, we identified acrylic acid leachable impurities in ganirelix drug products available in the market using mass spectrometry as an analytical technique. These impurities leached into the drug product during storage conditions. Characterization of the impurities was carried out through data obtained from HRMS and MS/MS analysis, revealing them as polyacrylic acid-ganirelix adduct impurities. This study offers valuable insights into identifying leachable and susceptible sites, providing a foundation for potential modifications in similar classes of drug products, thereby enhancing their safety and efficacy.

Cell and Gene Therapies: Challenges in Designing Extractables and Leachables Studies and Conducting Safety Assessments

Over the past decade, Cell and Gene Therapies (C>) have been an emerging therapeutic area with more than twenty C> drug products approved and over 1000 registered trials. The remarkable progress in these modalities brings new challenges for scientists who evaluate manufacturing and storage materials, including risk assessments for extractables and leachables (E&L). Establishing a business process to qualify materials for these applications is an important risk mitigation strategy in support of these assessments. Process validation verifying process performance and product quality requirements using qualified materials also ensures that leachables from the materials do not result in an impact to process and product. The authors provide an overview of available guidelines and publications relevant to E&L risk assessments that can be used to support ex vivo C> products, highlighting gaps and standardization needs in the areas of biocompatibility and extractables conditions. Finally, the authors present leachable testing strategies, relevant to the specific manufacturing and storage conditions of C> products, and safety assessment considerations for organic and inorganic chemical entities.

Antibody-Drug Conjugate Overview: a State-of-the-art Manufacturing Process and Control Strategy

Antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) comprise an antibody, linker, and drug, which direct their highly potent small molecule drugs to target tumor cells via specific binding between the antibody and surface antigens. The antibody, linker, and drug should be properly designed or selected to achieve the desired efficacy while minimizing off-target toxicity. With a unique and complex structure, there is inherent heterogeneity introduced by product-related variations and the manufacturing process. Here this review primarily covers recent key advances in ADC history, clinical development status, molecule design, manufacturing processes, and quality control. The manufacturing process, especially the conjugation process, should be carefully developed, characterized, validated, and controlled throughout its lifecycle. Quality control is another key element to ensure product quality and patient safety. A patient-centric strategy has been well recognized and adopted by the pharmaceutical industry for therapeutic proteins, and has been successfully implemented for ADCs as well, to ensure that ADC products maintain their quality until the end of their shelf life. Deep product understanding and process knowledge defines attribute testing strategies (ATS). Quality by design (QbD) is a powerful approach for process and product development, and for defining an overall control strategy. Finally, we summarize the current challenges on ADC development and provide some perspectives that may help to give related directions and trigger more cross-functional research to surmount those challenges.

An analysis of the effect of syringe barrel volume on performance and user perception

In the market, there are many types and shapes of syringes. One of the groupings of syringe types is based on barrel volume. The shape of the product design affects performance and user perception. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of barrel volume on its performance and user perception. We performed analysis following international organization for standardization 7886 procedures on syringe with 1 mL, 3 mL, 5 mL, and 10 mL volume. In addition, a user perception test was conducted on 29 respondents using a questionnaire with the Likert chart method. This study indicates that the bigger the syringe volume, the larger the dead space and the force to operate the piston are. A larger syringe volume also raises the volume that changes due to the plunger position increase. Meanwhile, the barrel volume does not affect water and water leakage, as we did not observe any leak during the syringe tests in our experiment. In addition, the user perception test shows that the barrel's length influences the ease of device control during the injection. The volume of the barrel negatively correlated with its effect to the environment. The safety features of all syringes are similar except for the 3 mL syringe, which has a value of 0.1 points difference to other syringes.

The hypodermic syringe performance based on the ISO 7886-1:2017: A narrative review

A syringe is used to inject fluid or medicine into the patient's soft tissue. The main components of the syringe were the needle, barrel, and plunger. The use of syringes in the medical world is relatively high, and especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, the use of hypodermic syringes increased sharply due to vaccination. The syringe used must be effective and of good quality, so the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has published test procedures and minimum specifications for hypodermic syringes. The performance of the syringe can be observed from the dead space, force piston operation, water and air leakage, and fitting position of the plunger in the barrel. This review shows that most researchers use the weighing method to measure the dead space, although some use other methods. The researchers found that most of the products met the minimum specifications of the ISO, and that the dimensions and shape of the syringe affected the dead space. Researchers have not examined other performance measures recommended by the ISO. Researchers have focused more on force injection than force piston operation, leakage after injection or back spray than air and water leakage, and reduction the friction of the plunger without considering the fitting position of the plunger in the barrel.

Observation and Mitigation of Leachables from Non-Product Contact Materials in Electromechanical Delivery Devices for Biotechnology Products

Battery-powered drug delivery devices are widely used as primary containers for storing and delivering therapeutic protein products to improve patient compliance and quality of life. Compared to conventional delivery approaches such as pre-filled syringes, battery-powered devices are more complex in design requiring new materials/components for proper functionality, which could cause potential product safety and quality concerns from the extractable and leachables (E&L) of the new materials/components. In this study, E&L assessments were performed on a battery-powered delivery device during the development and qualification of the device, where novel compound 2‑hydroxy-2-methylpropiophenone (HMPP) and related compounds were observed in both E&L. The source of the HMPP and related compounds was identified to be the nonproduct contact device batteries, in which HMPP photo-initiator was used as a curing agent in the battery sealant to prevent leakage of the battery electrolytes. Toxicology assessment was performed, which showed the levels of HMPP observed in the device lots were acceptable relative to the permitted daily exposure. A drug product HMPP spike study was also performed, where no product impact was observed. Based on these assessments, an action threshold and specification limits could be established as a control strategy, if needed, to mitigate the potential risks associate with the observed leachables. As a full resolution, seven battery candidates from different suppliers were screened and one new battery was successfully qualified for the delivery devices. Overall, the holistic E&L approach was fully successful in the development and qualification of the battery-powered devices for biotherapeutic products delivery ensuring product quality and patient safety. Non-product contact materials are commonly rated as low or no risk and typically considered as out of scope of E&L activities for delivery systems following industry benchmark and regulatory agency guidance. This case study is novel as it brings into attention the materials that might not normally be in consideration during the development process. It is highly recommended to understand materials in the context of intended use on a case-by-case basis and not to generalize to ensure successful development and qualification.

A Holistic Approach of Extractables and Leachables Assessment of Rubber Stoppered Glass Vial Systems for Biotechnology Products

Rubber stoppered glass vial systems are widely used as primary containers for storing and delivering therapeutic protein products to patients. Addressing concerns and regulatory expectations related to the risk to biologic drug product quality and patient safety from rubber stoppered glass vial systems requires implementation of an extractable and leachable evaluation program based on material understanding, risk assessment, literature review, and a comprehensive scientifically sound analytical testing methodology. The extractable and leachable study design consisted of twelve drug products filled in twelve different size glass vials capped with laminated and nonlaminated rubber stoppers made from three different rubber formulations. Design of the model solvents was successful as they had little to no analytical interference and mimicked the formulation conditions and generated representative extractables capable of predicting leachables. The extraction conditions of time and temperature were appropriate as not to degrade the test materials or the extractable compounds, and yet generated significant quantities for identification of the extractable compounds with confidence. The extractables testing results were capable of predicting the leachable profiles of the twelve drug products. In each case, the leachable profile was a subset of the extractable profile. The organic and elemental impurities of the leachable profiles of drug products were the end-to-end verification of the quality of the glass vials, rubber stoppers and drug product lifecycles. Overall, the holistic approach was fully successful in the qualification of different vial systems as primary containers and delivery systems for different biotherapeutic products to ensure product quality and patient safety.

Powder suspensions in non-aqueous vehicles for delivery of therapeutic proteins

Formulating biopharmaceuticals is a challenging task due to their complex and sensitive nature. Protein drugs are typically marketed either as an aqueous solution or as a lyophilizate. Usually aqueous solutions are preferred as neither drying nor reconstitution are required. But it may be unfeasible if the protein features low stability. An interesting alternative to avoid at least reconstitution are protein powder suspensions in non-aqueous vehicles. Such formulations combine the ready-to-use approach with the high protein stability in the solid state. Additionally, protein powder suspensions offer a potentially lower viscosity compared to aqueous solutions at high protein concentrations. Besides injection, other application routes might also benefit from the protein powder approach such as topical or inhalational delivery. Protein powders, which can be dispersed in the non-aqueous suspension vehicle, are usually prepared by spray-drying or freeze-drying with an additional milling step, but other techniques have also been described in literature. An ideal powder preparation technique results in minimum protein damage and yields particle sizes in the lower micrometre range and homogeneous particle size distribution enabling subcutaneous or intramuscular injection through hypodermic needles. As suspension vehicles traditional non-aqueous injectable liquids, such as plant oils, may be selected. But they show an inherent high viscosity, which can lead to unacceptable glide forces during injection. Furthermore, the vehicle should provide high product stability with respect to protein integrity and suspension resuspendability. This review will describe how proteins can be formulated as protein powder suspensions in non-aqueous vehicles for subcutaneous injection including potential vehicles, protein powder preparation techniques, protein and suspension physical stability, as well as the use in the field of high concentration protein formulations.

Prefilled dual chamber devices (DCDs) - Promising high-quality and convenient drug delivery system

Prefilled dual chamber devices (DCDs) are combination products containing freeze-dried drug and diluent in two separate chambers of the device. DCDs provide high stability and convenience to patients and doctors, thus significantly improving product quality, patient compliance and market competitiveness. DCDs should also provide seal integrity, sterility and compatibility with biopharmaceuticals and avoid leachability and needle stick injuries. DCDs are promising alternatives to traditional containers or devices for biopharmaceuticals. The regulatory and medical practice to choose plastic DCDs as better alternatives over well-established glass syringes will be addressed here. The impact and major issues during processing, manufacturing, and storage of DCDs are also highlighted. Further discussion clears its business potential, composition, stability testing, and quality standard requirements to deal with market competition. It also covers major role of extractables and leachables in storage stability of the product.

Investigating the pre-lethal cytotoxic effects of bis(2,4-di-tert-butylphenyl)phosphate on Chinese hamster ovary cells using high content analysis

Bis(2,4-di-tert-butylphenyl)Phosphate (bDtBPP) leaches out of polyethylene films used by the biopharmaceutical industry in single-use systems (SUS) for the culturing of drug producing cell lines. Previous studies found bDtBPP (0.025 - 0.110 mg/L) negatively affects Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cell growth and productivity. Less information is known about the potential early stages of subtle pre-lethal cytotoxic effects of bDtBPP. This study aimed to investigate the pre-lethal cytotoxic effects in CHO-K1 cells of bDtBPP (0.005 - 0.25 μg/ml) at process relevant concentrations following 2, 24 and 48 h exposure, using high content analysis to investigate multiple pre-lethal cytotoxicity markers. After 48 h exposure, bDtBPP (0.005 - 0.25 μg/ml; P ≤ 0.001) increased nuclear intensity. A dose- and time-dependent reduction in mitochondrial mass was seen after exposure to bDtBPP. Reactive oxygen species increased after 2 h exposure to 0.25 μg/ml bDtBPP, 24 and 48 h exposure to 0.05 - 0.25 μg/ml bDtBPP (P ≤ 0.01 and P ≤ 0.001). BDtBPP induced subtle pre-lethal cytotoxic effects on CHO-K1 cellular health. This study highlights the cellular health benefits of the biopharmaceutical industry switching to alternative SUS plastics which do not leach bDtBPP, which may enhance CHO-K1 cell productivity.

The Biologics Revolution and Endotoxin Test Concerns

The advent of “at will” production of biologics in lieu of harvesting animal proteins (i.e. insulin) or human cadaver proteins (i.e. growth hormone) has revolutionized the treatment of disease. While the fruits of the biotechnology revolution are widely acknowledged, the realization of the differences in the means of production and changes in the manner of control of potential impurities and contaminants in regard to the new versus the old are less widely appreciated. This chapter is an overview of the biologics revolution in terms of the rigors of manufacturing required to produce them, their mechanism of action, and caveats of endotoxin control. It is a continulation of the previous chapter that established a basic background knowledge of adaptive immune principles necessary to understand the mode of action of both disease causation and biologics therapeutic treatment via immune modulation.

MAbDelivery: Administration routes for antibody therapy Third LabEx MAbImprove industrial workshop, July 2, 2015 Tours, France

The annual "LabEx MAbImprove Industrial Workshops" are primarily intended to provide a comprehensive view about topics of interest for the pharmaceutical industry to scientists involved in research on therapeutic antibodies. The third workshop in this series, held July 2, 2015 in Tours, was dedicated to the optimization of delivery, namely all processes leading monoclonal antibodies to reach their target site. The commonly used intravenous (IV) route, although advantageous in terms of pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics, presents some disadvantages in terms of patients' convenience, therapeutic target access or treatment cost. Such problems led pharmaceutical companies to consider more straightforward and patient-friendly administration routes, bringing the need for specific formulations adapted to the specific inherent physicochemical challenges. In this context, the workshop provided an overview of these advances and opened discussion on new administration routes and formulation development. In the first session, the opportunities and challenges of 3 main routes of administration (IV, subcutaneous (SC), and pulmonary) were discussed, integrating protein stability issues. The next session was dedicated to medical devices intended for SC and pulmonary administration. The last session focused on specific formulations for monoclonal antibodies, particularly to successfully protect antibodies upon aerosolization, to develop highly concentrated formulations for SC administration, and to use formulation as a mean to overcome the barriers to oral protein delivery. As in the previous editions, this workshop gathered people from the academic and industrial spheres and allowed rich debates and discussions.

Influence of particle shedding from silicone tubing on antibody stability

Objectives

Peristaltic pumps are increasingly employed during fill & finish operations of a biopharmaceutical drug, due to sensitivity of many biological products to rotary piston pump-related stresses. Yet, possibly also unit operations using peristaltic pumps may shed particulates into the final product due to abrasion from the employed tubing. It was the aim of this study to elucidate the potential influence of particles shed from peristaltic pump tubing on the stability of a drug product.

Methods

Spiking solutions containing shed silicone particles were prepared via peristaltic pumping of placebo under recirculating conditions and subsequently characterized. Two formulated antibodies were spiked with two realistic, but worst-case levels of particles and a 6-month accelerated stability study with storage at 2–8, 25 and 40°C were conducted.

Key findings

Regarding the formation of aggregates and fragments, both mAbs degraded at their typically expected rates and no additional impact of spiked particles was observed. No changes were discerned however in turbidity, subvisible and visible particle assessments. Flow imaging data for one of the mAb formulations with spiked particles suggested limited colloidal stability of shed particles as indicated by a similar increase in spiked placebo.

Conclusions

Shed silicone particles from peristaltic pump tubing are assumed to not impair drug product stability.

Mechanisms Underlying the Immunogenicity of Therapeutic Proteins: Risk Assessment and Management Strategies

Antibodies to therapeutic proteins have caused serious adverse events and loss of efficacy in patients. Therefore, it is critical to manage the risk of antitherapeutic antibodies (ATA) during drug development and in the postmarketing environment. Risk assessments are an important tool for managing immunogenicity risk because they provide a format for considering the consequences and likelihood of ATA development. Because many factors influence both the severity of the consequences and likelihood of ATA development, successful risk assessments require input from all relevant disciplines, including product quality, manufacturing, nonclinical, pharmacology, and clinical. The results of risk assessments are used to develop appropriate risk reduction strategies, which may include product quality and manufacturing controls and elements of clinical trial design. This article discusses considerations for immunogenicity risk assessments and management.

Labware additives identified to be selective monoamine oxidase-B inhibitors

Plastic labware is used in all processes of modern pharmaceutical research, including compound storage and biological assays. The use of these plastics has created vast increases in productivity and cost savings as experiments moved from glass test tubes and capillary pipettes to plastic microplates and multichannel liquid handlers. One consequence of the use of plastic labware, however, is the potential release of contaminants and their resultant effects on biological assays. We report herein the identification of biologically active substances released from a commonly used plastic microplate. The active contaminants were identified by gas chromatography-mass spectroscopy as dodecan-1-ol, dodecyl 3-(3-dodecoxy-3-oxopropyl)sulfanylpropanoate, and dodecanoic acid, and they were found to be selective monoamine oxidase-B inhibitors.

Recent trends in the impurity profile of pharmaceuticals

Various regulatory authorities such as the International Conference on Harmonization (ICH), the United States Food and Drug administration (FDA), and the Canadian Drug and Health Agency (CDHA) are emphasizing on the purity requirements and the identification of impurities in Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs). The various sources of impurity in pharmaceutical products are — reagents, heavy metals, ligands, catalysts, other materials like filter aids, charcoal, and the like, degraded end products obtained during \ after manufacturing of bulk drugs from hydrolysis, photolytic cleavage, oxidative degradation, decarboxylation, enantiomeric impurity, and so on. The different pharmacopoeias such as the British Pharmacopoeia, United State Pharmacopoeia, and Indian Pharmacopoeia are slowly incorporating limits to allowable levels of impurities present in APIs or formulations. Various methods are used to isolate and characterize impurities in pharmaceuticals, such as, capillary electrophoresis, electron paramagnetic resonance, gas–liquid chromatography, gravimetric analysis, high performance liquid chromatography, solid-phase extraction methods, liquid–liquid extraction method, Ultraviolet Spectrometry, infrared spectroscopy, supercritical fluid extraction column chromatography, mass spectrometry, Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, and RAMAN spectroscopy. Among all hyphenated techniques, the most exploited techniques for impurity profiling of drugs are Liquid Chromatography (LC)-Mass Spectroscopy (MS), LC-NMR, LC-NMR-MS, GC-MS, and LC-MS. This reveals the need and scope of impurity profiling of drugs in pharmaceutical research.

Extraction, identification, and functional characterization of a bioactive substance from automated compound-handling plastic tips

Disposable plastic labware is ubiquitous in contemporary pharmaceutical research laboratories. Plastic labware is routinely used for chemical compound storage and during automated liquid-handling processes that support assay development, high-throughput screening, structure-activity determinations, and liability profiling. However, there is little information available in the literature on the contaminants released from plastic labware upon DMSO exposure and their resultant effects on specific biological assays. The authors report here the extraction, by simple DMSO washing, of a biologically active substance from one particular size of disposable plastic tips used in automated compound handling. The active contaminant was identified as erucamide ((Z)-docos-13-enamide), a long-chain mono-unsaturated fatty acid amide commonly used in plastics manufacturing, by gas chromatography/mass spectroscopy analysis of the DMSO-extracted material. Tip extracts prepared in DMSO, as well as a commercially obtained sample of erucamide, were active in a functional bioassay of a known G-protein-coupled fatty acid receptor. A sample of a different disposable tip product from the same vendor did not release detectable erucamide following solvent extraction, and DMSO extracts prepared from this product were inactive in the receptor functional assay. These results demonstrate that solvent-extractable contaminants from some plastic labware used in the contemporary pharmaceutical research and development (R&D) environment can be introduced into physical and biological assays during routine compound management liquid-handling processes. These contaminants may further possess biological activity and are therefore a potential source of assay-specific confounding artifacts.