The results demonstrated that the 2A/Furin technology was integrated successfully into a plasmid-based, industrial-scale, CHO antibody cell line development process, with minimal optimisation required. Use of 2A/Furin could enhance further the distribution of high-expressing clones, improve the average productivity of clones, while also improving the stability of high producer cell lines generated using this animal-free CHO antibody development platform.
BioSante Pharma claimed that the 2A/Furin technology rapidly generates cell lines that express levels of antibodies suitable for commercial production. The technology allows for high-level, equimolar expression of two coding sequences using a single promoter that is applicable for generating expression vectors for in-vivo gene therapy applications, pre-clinical target validation and lead identification as well as to rapidly generate high producer antibody cell lines that produce, in-vitro, high levels of mature antibody without requiring any amplification currently employed in antibody expression systems.
Simes, president and CEO of BioSante Pharma, said: “We are pleased by the results published by Novartis. These results are third party-generated support of our 2A/Furin technology.
“To this end, on April 26, 2010, we announced entering an Option Agreement with an undisclosed pharmaceutical company to obtain a non-exclusive license for the use of BioSante’s 2A/Furin technology in the expression of antibodies, and we continue to work toward additional non-exclusive licenses.”