Triple Space-Time Yield in Discontinuous Antibody Biomanufacturing by Combination of Synergetic Process Intensification Strategies

Monoclonal antibodies are the workhorse of the pharmaceutical industry due to their potential to treat a variety of different diseases while providing high specificity and efficiency. As a consequence, a variety of production processes have been established within the biomanufacturing industry. However, the rapidly increasing demand for therapeutic molecules amid the recent COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated that there still is a clear need to establish novel, highly productive, and flexible production processes. Within this work, we designed a novel discontinuous process by combining two intensification strategies, thus increasing inoculation density and media exchange via a fluidized bed centrifuge, to fulfill the need for a flexible and highly productive production process for therapeutic molecules. To establish this new process, firstly, a small-scale experiment was conducted to verify synergies between both intensification strategies, followed by a process transfer towards the proof-of-concept scale. The combination of these two-process intensification measures revealed overall synergies resulting in decreased process duration (-37%) and strongly enhanced product formation (+116%) in comparison to the not-intensified standard operation. This led to an impressive threefold increase in space-time yield, while only negligible differences in product quality could be observed. Overall, this novel process not only increases the ways to react to emergency situations thanks to its flexibility and possible short development times, but also represents a possible alternative to the current established processes due to high increases in productivity, in comparison to standard fed-batch operations.

A novel hybrid bioprocess strategy addressing key challenges of advanced biomanufacturing

Monoclonal antibodies (mAb) are commonly manufactured by either discontinuous operations like fed-batch (FB) or continuous processes such as steady-state perfusion. Both process types comprise opposing advantages and disadvantages in areas such as plant utilization, feasible cell densities, media consumption and process monitoring effort. In this study, we show feasibility of a promising novel hybrid process strategy that combines beneficial attributes of both process formats. In detail, our strategy comprises a short duration FB, followed by a fast media exchange and cell density readjustment, marking the start of the next FB cycle. Utilizing a small-scale screening tool, we were able to identify beneficial process parameters, including FB interval duration and reinoculation cell density, that allow for multiple cycles of the outlined process in a reproducible manner. In addition, we could demonstrate scalability of the process to a 5L benchtop system, using a fluidized-bed centrifuge as scalable media exchange system. The novel process showed increased productivity (+217%) as well as longer cultivation duration, in comparison to a standard FB with a significantly lower media consumption per produced product (-50%) and a decreased need for process monitoring, in comparison to a perfusion cultivation. Further, the process revealed constant glycosylation pattern in comparison to the perfusion cultivation and has strong potential for further scale-up, due to the use of fully scalable cultivation and media exchange platforms. In summary, we have developed a novel hybrid process strategy that tackles the key challenges of current biomanufacturing of either low productivity or high media consumption, representing a new and innovative approach for future process intensification efforts.

Boosting Productivity for Advanced Biomanufacturing by Re-Using Viable Cells

Monoclonal antibodies (mAb) have gained enormous therapeutic application during the last decade as highly efficient and flexible tools for the treatment of various diseases. Despite this success, there remain opportunities to drive down the manufacturing costs of antibody-based therapies through cost efficiency measures. To reduce production costs, novel process intensification methods based on state-of-the-art fed-batch and perfusion have been implemented during the last few years. Building on process intensification, we demonstrate the feasibility and benefits of a novel, innovative hybrid process that combines the robustness of a fed-batch operation with the benefits of a complete media exchange enabled through a fluidized bed centrifuge (FBC). In an initial small-scale FBC-mimic screening, we investigated multiple process parameters, resulting in increased cell proliferation and an elongated viability profile. Consecutively, the most productive process scenario was transferred to the 5-L scale, further optimized and compared to a standard fed-batch process. Our data show that the novel hybrid process enables significantly higher peak cell densities (163%) and an impressive increase in mAb amount of approximately 254% while utilizing the same reactor size and process duration of the standard fed-batch operation. Furthermore, our data show comparable critical quality attributes (CQAs) between the processes and reveal scale-up possibilities and no need for extensive additional process monitoring. Therefore, this novel process intensification strategy yields strong potential for transfer into future industrial manufacturing processes.

A novel approach for enumeration of extracellular vesicles from crude and purified cell culture samples

The interest in extracellular vesicles (EVs) has been increased in recent years due to their potential application in diagnosis and therapy of severe diseases. The versatile fields of application due to the numerous possible cargos and the targeted delivery system make them a promising biopharmaceutical product. However, their broad size range as well as varied surface protein content result in challenges for the purification, characterization, and quantification. In this study a novel method, based on high‐resolution flow cytometry, was examined for the enumeration of EVs in purified as well as crude process samples. In addition to quantification, samples were characterized by dynamic light scattering, zeta potential measurement, and analytical size exclusion chromatography. It has been demonstrated that EVs were successfully enumerated with the novel method, offering great benefits for development and monitoring of EV processes.