Jürgen Hubbuch

Effects of ionic strength and mobile phase pH on the binding orientation of lysozyme on different ion-exchange adsorbents

Chromatography is the most widely used technique for the purification of biopharmaceuticals in the biotech industry. Surprisingly, process development is often still based on empirical studies or experience; recently high-throughput screening stations are employed to minimize development time and to improve screening quality. Still, experimental effort remains high and a more detailed understanding of adsorption mechanisms on a molecular level underlying chromatographic separation could help in the future to select and design chromatography steps in silico. In this study, we focused on the elucidation of protein orientation upon adsorption onto a chromatographic resin. We identified two characteristic binding sites of lysozyme on SP Sepharose Fast Flow and one multipoint interaction of lysozyme with SP Sepharose XL. Increasing ionic strength did not significantly influence the binding, whereas changes in the mobile phase pH led to a re-orientation on SP Sepharose FF. This phenomenon agrees well with theoretical considerations, including a detailed description of the surface charge distribution with changing pH and linear elution experiments, giving an idea why proteins are often retained on ion-exchange materials beyond their isoelectric point.

High gradient magnetic separation versus expanded bed adsorption: a first principle comparison

A robust new adsorptive separation technique specifically designed for direct product capture from crude bioprocess feedstreams is introduced and compared with the current bench mark technique, expanded bed adsorption. The method employs product adsorption onto sub-micron sized non-porous superparamagnetic supports followed by rapid separation of the ‘loaded’ adsorbents from the feedstock using high gradient magnetic separation technology. For the recovery of Savinase® from a cell-free Bacillus clausii fermentation liquor using bacitracin-linked adsorbents, the integrated magnetic separation system exhibited substantially enhanced productivity over expanded bed adsorption when operated at processing velocities greater than 48 m h−1. Use of the bacitracin-linked magnetic supports for a single cycle of batch adsorption and subsequent capture by high gradient magnetic separation at a processing rate of 12 m h−1 resulted in a 2.2-fold higher productivity relative to expanded bed adsorption, while an increase in adsorbent collection rate to 72 m h−1 raised the productivity to 10.7 times that of expanded bed adsorption. When the number of batch adsorption cycles was then increased to three, significant drops in both magnetic adsorbent consumption (3.6 fold) and filter volume required (1.3 fold) could be achieved at the expense of a reduction in productivity from 10.7 to 4.4 times that of expanded bed adsorption.

Application of an Aqueous Two-Phase Systems High-Throughput Screening Method to Evaluate mAb HCP Separation

Aqueous two‐phase systems (ATPSs) as separation technique have regained substantial interest from the biotech industry. Biopharmaceutical companies faced with increasing product titers and stiffening economic competition reconsider ATPS as an alternative to chromatography. As the implementation of an ATPS is material, time, and labor intensive, a miniaturized and automated screening process would be beneficial. In this article such a method, its statistical evaluation, and its application to a biopharmaceutical separation task are shown. To speed up early stage ATPS profiling an automated application of the cloud‐point method for binodal determination was developed. PEG4000–PO4 binodals were measured automatically and manually and were found to be identical within the experimental error. The ATPS screening procedure was applied to a model system and an industrial separation task. PEG4000–PO4 systems at a protein concentration of 0.75 mg/mL were used. The influence of pH, NaCl addition, and tie line length was investigated. Lysozyme as model protein, two monoclonal antibodies, and a host cell protein pool were used. The method was found to yield partition coefficients identical to manually determined values for lysozyme. The monoclonal antibodies were shifted from the bottom into the upper phase by addition of NaCl. This shift occurred at lower NaCl concentration when the pH of the system was closer to the pI of the distributed protein. Addition of NaCl, increase in PEG4000 concentration and pH led to significant loss of the mAb due to precipitation. Capacity limitations of these systems were thus demonstrated. The chosen model systems allowed a reduction of up to 50% HCP with a recovery of greater than 95% of the target proteins. As these values might not be industrially relevant when compared to current chromatographic procedures, the developed screening procedure allows a fast evaluation of more suitable and optimized ATPS system for a given task. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2011; 108:69–81.

Rational and systematic protein purification process development: the next generation

Current biopharmaceutical manufacturing strongly relies on using purification platform processes, offering harmonization of practices and speed-to-market. However, the ability of such processes to respond quickly to anticipated higher quality and capacity demands is under question. Here, we describe novel approaches for purification process development that incorporate biothermodynamics, modern high throughput experimentation and simulation tools. Such development leads to production platform-specific databases containing thermodynamic protein descriptors of major host cell proteins over a range of experimental conditions. This will pave the way for in silico purification process development, providing better process understanding and the potential to respond quickly to product quality and market demands. Future efforts will focus on improving this field further and enabling more rationale in process development.

High‐throughput methods for miniaturization and automation of monoclonal antibody purification processes

In the last decade, high‐throughput downstream process development techniques have entered the biopharmaceutical industry. As chromatography is the standard downstream purification method, several high‐throughput chromatographic methods have been developed and applied including miniaturized chromatographic columns for utilization on liquid handling stations. These columns were used to setup a complete downstream process on a liquid handling station for the first time. In this article, a monoclonal antibody process was established in lab‐scale and miniaturized afterwards. The scale‐down methodology is presented and discussed. Liquid handling in miniaturized single and multicolumn processes was improved and applicability was demonstrated by volume balances. The challenges of absorption measurement are discussed and strategies were shown to improve volume balances and mass balances in 96‐well microtiter plates. The feasibility of miniaturizing a complete downstream process was shown. In the future, analytical bottlenecks should be addressed to gain the full benefit from miniaturized complete process development.

Scalable recovery of plasmid DNA based on aqueous two‐phase separation

Future developments in gene therapy and DNA vaccination depend on cost‐effective large‐scale production of pharmaceutical‐grade pDNA (plasmid DNA). Given the large amount of impurities present in the feedstock, purification processes that have high specificity and capacity at a moderate cost are required. In the present study, we describe a non‐chromatographic procedure based on aqueous two‐phase extraction allowing a fast and simply scalable capture step. PEG [poly(ethylene glycol)] in combination with potassium citrate or potassium phosphate was tested as phase component for extraction. By increasing either PEG or salt concentration, the partitioning of nucleic acids changed from bottom to top phase. Phase systems with a composition of 15% PEG 800 and 20% potassium phosphate at pH 7.0 showed a strong partitioning of pDNA to the bottom phase, linked to a clear decrease in open circular pDNA, while proteins, genomic DNA and RNA remain at the top or at the interphase. A great advantage of the current process is that the complete procedure of lysis, precipitation, clarification and extraction can be performed in a single vessel. The number of denatured and sheared genomic DNAs in a spiking experiment was found to be depleted by more than 99%.

A sub-two minutes method for monoclonal antibody-aggregate quantification using parallel interlaced size exclusion high performance liquid chromatography

In process development and during commercial production of monoclonal antibodies (mAb) the monitoring of aggregate levels is obligatory. The standard assay for mAb aggregate quantification is based on size exclusion chromatography (SEC) performed on a HPLC system. Advantages hereof are high precision and simplicity, however, standard SEC methodology is very time consuming. With an average throughput of usually two samples per hour, it neither fits to high throughput process development (HTPD), nor is it applicable for purification process monitoring. We present a comparison of three different SEC columns for mAb-aggregate quantification addressing throughput, resolution, and reproducibility. A short column (150 mm) with sub-two micron particles was shown to generate high resolution (~1.5) and precision (coefficient of variation (cv)<1) with an assay time below 6 min. This column type was then used to combine interlaced sample injections with parallelization of two columns aiming for an absolute minimal assay time. By doing so, both lag times before and after the peaks of interest were successfully eliminated resulting in an assay time below 2 min. It was demonstrated that determined aggregate levels and precision of the throughput optimized SEC assay were equal to those of a single injection based assay. Hence, the presented methodology of parallel interlaced SEC (PI-SEC) represents a valuable tool addressing HTPD and process monitoring.

Confocal laser scanning microscopy as an analytical tool in chromatographic research

In recent years, confocal laser scanning microscopy has been developed into a non-invasive tool to probe intra-particle profiles of protein in chromatographic adsorbents. A necessary prerequisite when using this technique lies in the labeling of proteins with fluorescent probes. The quality of the obtained results is thus strongly dependent on the probes used, its sensitivity on experimental parameters and the change of protein characteristics upon binding. In this review, the fundamental issues when using fluorescent probes are described, before giving a critical evaluation on published literature in the field of confocal laser scanning microscopy for the analysis of chromatographic principles.

A tool for selective inline quantification of co‐eluting proteins in chromatography using spectral analysis and partial least squares regression

Selective quantification of co‐eluting proteins in chromatography is usually performed by offline analytics. This is time‐consuming and can lead to late detection of irregularities in chromatography processes. To overcome this analytical bottleneck, a methodology for selective protein quantification in multicomponent mixtures by means of spectral data and partial least squares regression was presented in two previous studies. In this paper, a powerful integration of software and chromatography hardware will be introduced that enables the applicability of this methodology for a selective inline quantification of co‐eluting proteins in chromatography. A specific setup consisting of a conventional liquid chromatography system, a diode array detector, and a software interface to Matlab® was developed. The established tool for selective inline quantification was successfully applied for a peak deconvolution of a co‐eluting ternary protein mixture consisting of lysozyme, ribonuclease A, and cytochrome c on SP Sepharose FF. Compared to common offline analytics based on collected fractions, no loss of information regarding the retention volumes and peak flanks was observed. A comparison between the mass balances of both analytical methods showed, that the inline quantification tool can be applied for a rapid determination of pool yields. Finally, the achieved inline peak deconvolution was successfully applied to make product purity‐based real‐time pooling decisions. This makes the established tool for selective inline quantification a valuable approach for inline monitoring and control of chromatographic purification steps and just in time reaction on process irregularities. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2014;111: 1365–1373.

Molecular dynamics simulations on aqueous two-phase systems - Single PEG-molecules in solution

BackgroundMolecular Dynamics (MD) simulations are a promising tool to generate molecular understanding of processes related to the purification of proteins. Polyethylene glycols (PEG) of various length are commonly used in the production and purification of proteins. The molecular mechanisms behind PEG driven precipitation, aqueous two-phase formation or the effects of PEGylation are however still poorly understood.ResultsIn this paper, we ran MD simulations of single PEG molecules of variable length in explicitly simulated water. The resulting structures are in good agreement with experimentally determined 3D structures of PEG. The increase in surface hydrophobicity of PEG of longer chain length could be explained on an atomic scale. PEG-water interactions as well as aqueous two-phase formation in the presence of PO4 were found to be correlated to PEG surface hydrophobicity.ConclusionsWe were able to show that the taken MD simulation approach is capable of generating both structural data as well as molecule descriptors in agreement with experimental data. Thus, we are confident of having a good in silico representation of PEG.