The chromatography medium is claimed to purify virus preparations significantly faster than conventional technology with the added benefit of easy scale-up for the production of clinical batches.
The product - Q Sepharose XL virus licensed - has been developed under licence by Amersham, based on intellectual property belonging to French biopharmaceutical company Gencell.
The latter company has a patent covering the use of Q Sepharose XL for purification of adenovirus and other viruses.
For purification purposes, the product licensed can be used in conjunction with crossflow filtration and chromatography systems, such as Amersham's own äKTA pilot and BioProcess units.
"With viral-based gene therapy and vaccine products now moving into late-stage clinical development, there is a growing need for faster and simpler methods for purifying viral vectors, in particular adenovirus," said Francis Blanche, head of process development at Gencell.
Amersham maintains that chromatographic separation for virus purification has a number of advantages over centrifugation, the other most commonly used technique.
For example, chromatographic purification using Q Sepharose XL requires only a few hours, in comparison to as long as 24 hours with centrifugation, and the scalability of the process simplifies the transition to commercial-scale manufacturing of viral-based products.
For additional information on the new product, visit Amersham Biosciences' website.