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Evaluating the impact of suramin additive on CHO cells producing Fc-fusion protein

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Abstract

Objective

To examine the effects of suramin in CHO cell cultures in terms of the cell culture performance and quality of the Fc-fusion protein.

Results

Suramin had positive effects on the CHO cell cultures. The addition of suramin caused an increase in the viable cell density, cell viability, and titer of the Fc-fusion protein. Moreover, suramin had no impact on protein aggregation and enhanced the sialic acid contents of Fc-fusion protein by 1.18-fold. The enhanced sialylation was not caused by the increased nucleotide sugar level but by the inhibition of sialidase activity. The results showed that suramin inhibited apoptosis and had positive impacts on the productivity and quality of Fc-fusion protein.

Conclusion

The addition of suramin increased the production of Fc-fusion protein and enhanced sialylation when added as a supplement to the media component in CHO cell cultures. This study suggested that suramin could be a beneficial additive during the biological production in terms of the productivity and quality of Fc-fusion protein.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) Grant funded by the Korea government (MSIT) (No. 2019R1F1A1061676).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biological Engineering, Inha University, Incheon, 22212, Republic of Korea

    Jin-Hyuk Lim, Hyun-Myoung Cha, Hye-Jin Han & Dong-Il Kim

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  1. Jin-Hyuk Lim
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  2. Hyun-Myoung Cha
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  3. Hye-Jin Han
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Correspondence to Dong-Il Kim.

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Lim, JH., Cha, HM., Han, HJ. et al. Evaluating the impact of suramin additive on CHO cells producing Fc-fusion protein. Biotechnol Lett 41, 1255–1263 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10529-019-02728-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10529-019-02728-9

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