On May 12th, the biaseparations.com website will be retired and migrated tosartorius.com.Learn moreabout our combined offering today!
2018

During recombinant adeno associated virus (rAAV) downstream processing, a large amount of host-cell and product related impurities needs to be removed from the product. Succesful process on laboratory scale, such as Cesium chloride purification, lacks scalability when the process is due to be transfered to larger industrial scale. The aim of the study was to develop robust, fast and effective rAAV virus purification platform, which can be used for several AAV serotypes with various inserts. Lysed harvest and supernatant of rAAV9 were first captured and concentrated on CIMmultus™ OH column, followed by intermediate step on CIMmultus™ SO3 column and further polishing on CIMmultus™ QA column. Derived purity of industrial scale monolith purification product was compared to laboratory scale purification.

Attachments

Full view

2017

New vaccines against Influenza A are required each year to keep up with the most virulent evolving strains. This highlights a need for predictive analytical tools that can aid purification process development and validation. Rapid and reliable quantification of Influenza A virus is therefore of the utmost importance for enabling good yields and controlling the costs of the downstream processing. Here we demonstrate the ability of monolithic chromatography media to produce process predictive profiles that can document ability to remove impurities and obtain high product recoveries.

CIMac™ Analytical Columns are short bed high performance monolithic columns offering all the advantages of CIM® monolithic technology. Their small volume and short column length allow the operation at high volumetric flow rates enabling to receive the information about the product quantity and purity in just a few minutes. Hence, the CIMac™ Analytical Columns can be effectively used for the in-process and final control of various samples from different purification process steps.

Attachments

Full view

2016

Adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors of various serotypes are considered to have high potential for gene therapy applications. Currently, manufacturing of AAV vectors faces the challenge of co-production of incompletely formed particles lacking a recombinant viral genome. Empty capsids increase the dose of total AAV administered for efficient transduction and are thought to cause unwanted immunological reactions against the virus.Removal of empty capsids during manufacturing, as well as analysis of empty/full AAV particle content is therefore a critical requirement for any AAV production process. This poster demonstrates how CIMmultus™ QA monolithic columns can be used to remove empty AAV capsids from the product chromatographically in a single step.

Attachments

Full view

The upstream and downstream monoclonal antibody (mAb) bioprocessing makes them susceptible to physical and chemical modifications. In the biotechnological production process of mAbs, structural variations may arise due to some enzymatic activity. Antibody charge variants have gained considerable attention in the biotechnology industry due to their potential influence on stability and biological activity and cation-exchange chromatography (CEX) is one of the typical approaches for mAb charge variant analyses. We tested several CEX columns under different conditions and the best column for isotype separation was weak cation-exchanging CIMac COOH chromatographic monolith in pH gradient. We have proven a flow independent separation of mAb charge variants and in this way, a resolution comparable to classical CEX particulate-based analytical columns was achieved in only 6 min analysis time.

Attachments

Full view

2015

CIMac™ r-Protein A Analytical Column is short bed, high performance monolithic column . Primarly is intended for fast, efficient, and reproducible qualitative and quantitative analyses of Immunoglobulin G (IgG). It is suitable for use with HPLC and UPLC systems. Quantification of Immunoglobulin G is possible between 0.2 μg and 20 μg. Its small volume and short column length allow operation at high volumetric flow rates ( up to 3mL/min). The information about product quantity and purity is thus generated in just 1 minute! The column has innovative symmetric design for bi-directional flow, also extending column lifetime.

Attachments

Full view

2014

Biological samples often consist of a main component, such as albumin in serum, and many other constituents, present in smaller quantities, but nevertheless of high importance in biological systems. When detection of the low-abundance molecules is needed, the main component could interfere with the analyte, complicating the analysis or even making it impossible. In such cases a possible approach is to remove the interfering main component from the sample before the analysis.

Monolithic columns (CIM®) are a great foundation to build affinity chromatography methods, as they offer fast flow rates and can be modified to accomodate various ligands. We selected two most promising approaches for oriented binding of antibodies to the monolithic support. One approach was to bind antibodies to a protein A (pA) column with consequent crosslinking of the protein complex. The other approach was to chemically activate antibodies and bind them selectively to hydrazide-modified (HDZ) monolith surface.

Attachments

Full view

Interactions between antibodies and their antigens are highly selective and therefore immensely popular for affinity chromatography. Consequently, numereous antibody immobilizations were performed on monolithic supports via different activation chemistries in the last decade. Despite the work already done there was no systematic study, where as many as possible activation chemistries were tested for the immobilization of a model monoclonal antibody with subsequent chromatographic characterization of the affinity support. In this work, various preactivated CIM monolithic columns were used for the immobilization of a model monoclonal IgG.

Attachments

Full view

Monolithic ion exchange CIM® (Convective Interaction Media) columns have been proven in quantitative analysis of different immunoglobulins such as IgM and IgG from human plasma or cell supernatants. The separation mechanism is based on ionic interactions between the ion exchange monolith and immunoglobulin that are controlled by salt concentration. Here we present another possibility of IgM determination based on monolithic CIM® OH columns where the interactions may be controlled by changes in salt concentration or by pH increase. A method for quantitative HPLC determination of IgM in cell supernatant with fluorimetric detection was developed on CIM® OH column (0.34 mL) by means of pH increase. Optimal separation of IgM from cell supernatant matrix was achieved by combining acetate and phosphate buffer in a suitable gradient profile. Two different quantification methods, i.e. calibration curve and standard addition.

Attachments

Full view

Determining the concentration of viruses is a crucial step in any production process. The most commonly used methods for virus quantification are either based on the infectivity of the virus (plaque assay, TCID50) determination of their genomic material (qPCR), or protein content (SRID, ELISA) and are very cumbersome and time consuming. HPLC analytical methods represent a fast alternative to these assays since they provide information on the virus content and purity in a matter of minutes. Due to the structural properties of the monolithic supports, monolithic analytical columns offer a great advantage over particle based HPLC columns in terms of time and their ability to separate large biomolecules, like viruses, VLPs, pDNA.

In this poster the performance of the CIMac™ Adeno Analytical Column – a monolith based anion exchange column, designed for fast and reproducible analyses of adenoviruses was evaluated. CIMac Adeno column can be used for designing a fast finger printing method that is applicable for monitoring the DSP production process of adenoviruses. Once the basic analytical parameters like linearity and sensitivity are determined using a purified adenoviral standard, the metod can be applied for quantitative determination of adenoviruses.

Attachments

Full view

Enrichment of phosphopeptides prior to LC-MS analysis is a crucial sample preparation step because of their low stoichiometry in biological sample, longer retention on reversed phase columns, and lower ionization efficiency compared to non-phosphorylated peptides [1].The use of metal oxides, most prominently of TiO2 enabled efficient and relatively simple phosphopeptide-enrichment. In this study a new monolithic column from BIA Separations containing immobilized TiO2-nanoparticles was tested for its ability to enrich phosphopeptides. The TiO2-column was also tested for possible carryover originating from biological samples. In conclusion, tested monolithic TiO2 columns show significant binding ability for phosphopeptides and are considered as suitable for phosphopeptide enrichment.

Attachments

Full view

The demand for human immunoglobulin is invariably increasing on an annual basis. To satisfy demands, different manufacturing processes are used to isolate immunoglobulins from human plasma. A quest for alternative paths in manufacturing not only requires development of the most economical manufacturing process, but also a rapid method development and development of reliable analytics for manufacturing monitoring. For an efficient improvement of the purification methods as well as for in-process control during manufacturing stage, the usage of reliable and fast analytical techniques are of crucial importance.

Fast and reliable fingerprint-based method for characterization of immunoglobulin G (IgG) prepared from Cohn I+II+III paste in two chromatographic steps is presented. The fingerprint method bases on partial separation of proteins in linear gradient on CIMac QA 0.1 mL column. Partial separation of proteins does not allow simple quantitative analysis of the samples during the IgG production from Cohn I + II + III paste, however, a very accurate qualitative information about the composition of the sample can be obtained in less than 5 minutes.

Attachments

Full view

The challenge of efficient purification of gene therapy vectors
• The most commonly used gene transfer vectors are adenoviruses, lentiviruses, adeno-associated viruses, retroviruses, vaccinia viruses, and pDNA
• Due to their large size and sensitivity to pH, temperature and shear stress, purification is challenging and time-consuming
• A fast and efficient downstream processing purification method is required to isolate sufficient amounts of vectors with the final purity and state that conforms to stringent regulatory demands.

Solution: Convective Interaction Media Monoliths
• Convective interaction media (CIM) monolith chromatography
• Functionalised polydimethacrylate (QA, DEAE, OH, SO3)
• Precisely defined pore sizes
• Radial flow of solute
• Convective mass transfer

Attachments

Full view

2013

The development of safe, effective, and affordable vaccines has become a global effort due to its vast impact on overall world health conditions. A brief overview of cancer vaccine characterization techniques, especially in the area of high-resolution mass spectrometry, is presented. It is highly conceivable that the proper use of advanced technologies such mass spectrometry, along with the appropriate chemical and physical property evaluations, will yield tremendous in-depth scientific understanding for the characterization of vaccines in various stages of the development. This work presents the physiochemical and biological characterization of two cancer vaccines: Racotumomab and Her1-ECD. Racotumomab monoclonal antibody is a murine anti-idiotypic antibody that mimics N-glycolyl-GM3 gangliosides. This antibody has been tested as an anti-idiotypic cancer vaccine, adjuvated in Al(OH)3, in several clinical trials for melanoma, breast, and lung cancer. The Her1-ECD is a vaccine preparation based on the extracellular domain of HER1 and it is being evaluated in Phase I clinical study in patients with refractory prostate cancer.

Attachments

Full view

A monolith is a stationary phase made of single piece of porous material. Unlike conventional particle-shaped chromatographic supports, the pores of the monolith are interconnected and form a network of channels with diameters ranging around 1500 nm. The binding sites in these channels are highly accessible for target molecules and since the predominant mass transfer depends on convection rather than diffusion, the dynamic binding capacity is flow independent. These characteristics make the monolithic supports suitable for fast separation and purification of large biomolecules such as proteins, DNA and viruses, which sometimes exceed 200 nm in size and thus have low diffusion constants.

In this work we tried to quantify influenza A virus using an analytical CIM monolith column. First a screening of available CIM stationary phases was performed in order to establish the optimal stationary phase for the binding of the virus. The effect of the mobile phase composition and pH on the recovery and peak shape of the virus was investigated. Linearity was examined. The amount of virus in the flow-through and elution fractions was determined with the haemagglutination assay and the purity of the fractions with SDS PAGE. All experiments were performed with an inactivated Influenza A/Wisconsin PZC whole virus sample that was produced in eggs.

Attachments

Full view

2012

Glycosylation is one of nature mechanism for invreasing the diversity of protein structures affecting biophysical vjaracterostocs and bioactivity. Glycoproteins exist as mixture of different isoforms ("glycoforms"). In this mixture a group od different glyco components is attached to individual glycosylation site. Different glyco componets attached to the same site may have diggerent effect on biophysical charachteristics of glycoproteins. The type of glycosylation and the degree of heterogenity are important for many reasons starting from stability, activity, clinical efficency (toxicity, pharmacokinetics, immunogenicity), to standardization and patentability.

Thus, it is necessary to separate glycoforms and as much as possible to difine the heterogenity i.e. population of of glyco components attached to the singele glycosysilation site.

External invertase is a widely usef model for studying the influance of the glyco-component on protein stability. External invertase from yeast Sccharomyces cerevisiae has 14 potential N-glycosylation sites in the sequence, 13 of which are fully or partially glycosylated with olygomannans of varying sizes.

Attachments

Full view

Extensive research in the last two decades has led to the realization of Immunoglobulin M (IgM) as a potential therapeutic and diagnostic agent for autoimmune diseases, infectious diseases and as an AIDS and cancer vaccine. Growing interest in these molecules has created a need for an accurate, rapid and simple analytical method to measure IgM concentrations during the production (in-process control) in cell culture supernatants as well as in all purification steps in the downstream processing.

Convective interaction media (CIM) monolithic columns has been increasingly recognized as a quantification tool for large molecules. Affinity ligands like protein A and protein G are the most common ligands used for antibody capture and analysis.

Attachments

Full view

Recombinant Adenovirus (rAd) is commonly used for vaccination and gene transfer for cancer applications. This vector is widely used in phase I/II clinical trials. Therefore we believe that upstream and downstream processes should be improved.

We developed a production manufacturing process for rAd serotype 5 n HEK293 grown into disposable fixed-bed iCELLis™ bioreactors (ATMI LifeSciences). The purification process was reduced to one single chromatography step using the Convective Interaction Media, anion exchanger (CIM ® QA monolithic column, Bia Separations).

Briefly, rAd particles were extracted from cells using Triton X-100, depth filtered to discard cell debris, captured and purified out on CIM ® QA. The shallow gradient used for the elution of the vector allowed the separation of different rAd particles populations more or less enriched in full particles. A final step based on Tangential Flow Filtration (TFF) in hollow fibers allowed the removal of remaining impurities and the formulation of the vector batch.

In addition, we developed an analytical method on CIMac™ QA analytical column (Bia Separations) to characterize the different steps of the process, and to track the differences linked to the production runs to increase the robustness of the process. This method provided elution profiles for each step as well as titer of the purified rAd in the final step.

The rAd was produced in an iCELLis™ nano fixed-bed bioreactor (0.5-5.3 m2), purified in a 8mL CIM ® QA monolithic column, scaled up in a medium-scale size 80mL column. We are currently extending the rAd production in a 133m2 iCELLis I000™ bioreactor with a purification step using a 8L CIM® QA monolithic column to purify out up to 1x1015 vector particles.

Attachments

Full view

Monolithic supports represent a new generation of chromatographic media. Due to their large inner channel diameters and enhanced mass transfer characteristics, methacrylate monoliths (CIM® monolithic columns) offer efficient and fast separation of large biomolecules like pDNA, viruses and monoclonal antibodies. High binding capacity for viral particles, good product recovery and resolution are also benefits of monoliths. During loading of MDCK cell-derived H1N1 inactivated influenza virus particles onto monolithic columns, increased back pressure is sometimes observed. This is especially an issue if a large amount of virus needs to be purified since the back pressure depends on the loading volume. The goal of this work was to determine the factors contributing to this effect. We tried to prevent the increased back pressure by treating virus harvests with different precolumn phases (LRATM - Lipid removal agent, Amberlite® XAD 7HP, epoxy monolithic column) and by filtering the virus material before loading it onto the column. To compare different pre-treatment strategies of the virus material the dynamic binding capacity of CIMac QA for virus was first determined, resulting in approximately 1x1013 virus particles per ml. Than loadings of the pre-treated virus material at 75% of the column capacity were performed and mass balances for the virus, DNA and proteins were investigated. Another goal of this work was to find a good regeneration strategy for the columns where increased back pressure occurred. For this reason different regeneration procedures using lipase, benzonase, 2-propanol and NaOH treatment were tested on the columns with increased back pressure.

Attachments

Full view

Traditional waste water treatment usually does not remove or inactivate all of the potentially pathogen microorganisms present in the waste water. This is especially true for enteric viruses that are introduced into the environment through the discharge of effluent from waste water treatment plants - WWTP (Simmons et al, 2011). Although discharged concentrations of viruses are low they can still lead to infection. For some enteric viruses ingestion of only 10 - 100 virus particles is enough to initiate the disease, what calls for very sensitive detection methods. It has been previously shown that CIM-quaternary amine (QA) monolithic supports are a good tool for concentration of viruses in water (Gutierrez-Aguirre et al, 2011). Here we go one step further and evaluate CIM monoliths not just for concentration of enteric viruses but also for their removal from effluent waters.

Attachments

Full view

Potato spindle tuber viroid (PSTVd) is the causal agent of a number of agriculturally important diseases. It is a single-stranded, circular and uncapsidated RNA molecule with 359 nucleotides and no coding capacity. Because of its complex secondary/tertiary structure it is very stable ex vivo and it is easily transmitted mechanically by contaminated hands, tools, machinery, etc. In this work, we describe the development and optimization of a method for concentrating PSTVd using CIM monolithic supports.

Attachments

Full view