Accelerated cell culture process development and characterization for cilgavimab/tixagevimab (AZD7442) for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19.

The global COVID-19 pandemic ignited an unprecedented race to develop vaccines and antibody therapeutics. AstraZeneca's pursuit to provide AZD7442 (EVUSHELD), two long-acting, SARS-CoV-2 spike receptor binding domain-specific neutralizing monoclonal antibodies, to individuals at risk on highly accelerated timelines challenged our traditional ways of process development and spurred the rapid adoption of novel approaches. Conventional upstream development processes were replaced by agile strategies that combined technological advances and highly accelerated workflows. With calculated business risks and close cross-functional collaborations, this process paved the way for hyper accelerated antibody development from discovery through manufacturing, process validation, emergency use authorization filing, and global regulatory approvals. The result was initiation of commercial manufacturing at a contract manufacturing organization less than 6 months from the selection of cilgavimab and tixagevimab-a process that historically has taken close to 10 years.

Development of a high yielding expression platform for the introduction of non-natural amino acids in protein sequences.

The ability to genetically encode non-natural amino acids (nnAAs) into proteins offers an expanded tool set for protein engineering. nnAAs containing unique functional moieties have enabled the study of post-translational modifications, protein interactions, and protein folding. In addition, nnAAs have been developed that enable a variety of biorthogonal conjugation chemistries that allow precise and efficient protein conjugations. These are being studied to create the next generation of antibody-drug conjugates with improved efficacy, potency, and stability for the treatment of cancer. However, the efficiency of nnAA incorporation, and the productive yields of cell-based expression systems, have limited the utility and widespread use of this technology. We developed a process to isolate stable cell lines expressing a pyrrolysyl-tRNA synthetase/tRNApyl pair capable of efficient nnAA incorporation. Two different platform cell lines generated by these methods were used to produce IgG-expressing cell lines with normalized antibody titers of 3 g/L using continuous perfusion. We show that the antibodies produced by these platform cells contain the nnAA functionality that enables facile conjugations. Characterization of these highly active and robust platform hosts identified key parameters that affect nnAA incorporation efficiency. These highly efficient host platforms may help overcome the expression challenges that have impeded the developability of this technology for manufacturing proteins with nnAAs and represents an important step in expanding its utility.

Production and characterization of active recombinant human factor II with consistent sialylation.

Coagulation factor II (prothrombin; FII) is the pre-proteolyzed precursor to thrombin in the coagulation cascade. It has 10 sites of gamma-carboxylation, which are required for its bioactivity, and is N-glycosylated at three of four putative sites. Production of recombinant human FII (rhFII) using a platform fed-batch process designed for monoclonal antibody production resulted in low levels of gamma-carboxylation and sialylation. There have not been any prior reports of successful process development and clinical manufacture of rhFII with optimal, consistent gamma-carboxylation and sialylation. In order to develop such a fed-batch process, various process parameters were evaluated to determine their impact on product quality. Process temperature and temperature shift timing were important for both sialic acid level and gamma-carboxyglutamate (Gla) level. In addition, vitamin K concentration and the type of surfactant used for preparation of vitamin K stock solution were also important for gamma carboxylation. A fed-batch study performed with various medium additives known to be involved in the N-glycosylation pathway, such as N-acetyl-d-mannosamine (ManNAc), galactose (Gal), dexamethasone, and manganese sulfate, increased the level of sialylation and enabled the elucidation of some potential bottlenecks in the sialylation pathway. The optimized process based on these studies yielded a reduction in the level of missing Gla by 0.4 moles per mole of rhFII in cell culture and a nearly threefold increase in sialic acid level. The process was successfully implemented at the 2000 L scale where a high Gla level and sialylation levels were achieved in all GMP lots. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2017;114: 1991-2000. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.