This one took me a few minutes to figure out -- especially with the Celtics down and my attention divided. With the C's up 11 points, I was able to figure it out finally!
HCPs are residual host cell proteins and they are problematic for antibody production. When people manufacture antibodies (using that word to distinguish from our own native antibodies), they are made in host cells. Before that antibody can be used to treat people it has to be heavily and perfectly characterized. The HCPs are proteins that might tag along and we need to know what they are as well -- and be able to prove that they are safely gone and no risk to patients.
Sounds tough, right? It was, but this new paper ASAP at ACS shows you exactly how to pull it off!
How'd they do it? They take advantage of the fact that mABs are trypsin resistant in their native state (did you know that? I didn't!) and the stuff they can digest ends up mostly being HCPs. Shotgun proteomics on a QE Plus and downstream analysis with informed knowledge of their host cell allows them to develop a rapid and sensitive new assay suitable for a production environment!
No comments:
Post a Comment