US biopharmaceutical firm Acceptys has licensed an immortal humanised cell line from Columbia University, which will allow it to discover and produce fully human monoclonal antibodies and other human proteins for use as therapeutic products to treat infectious and other diseases.
The cell line, MFP-2, is used in the creation of immortal human hybridomas through the fusion of MFP-2 cells with antibody-producing human lymphocytes. The antibodies produced by the resulting hybridomas have a composition similar to antibodies taken from human sera and are reproduced in large quantities. Moreover, the hybridomas have been shown to be stable for over four years.
Acceptys intends to use the cell line to directly isolate and capture antibody-producing B-lymphocytes from targeted patient populations. In addition, because the same human hybridoma system that is used in antibody discovery is also used in antibody production, the company believes it will significantly shorten the development time for its therapeutic programmes.
Daniel Devine, Acceptys' chief executive, said that the company will use the MFP-2 cell line "as a fusion partner to effectively capture, characterise and produce large numbers of fully human monoclonal antibodies against many important disease targets, all without compromising the human composition of the product. In addition, we see tremendous opportunities for the use of MFP-2 for the production of other recombinant proteins for use as therapeutics."