New Developments in Hollow-Fiber Cell Culture

With the growth and development of genetic engineering and hybridoma technologies, cell culture has taken on a whole new life. Genetically engineered mammalian cells produce and secrete proteins of scientific and therapeutic importance. Hybridoma technology, the science of fusing immune mouse cells to immortal cancer cells, makes it possible to produce monoclonal antibodies in quantity from cells grown in culture. To produce these proteins in the quantities required for commercial use, it became necessary to scale up cell culture efforts. Many high-cost capital and equipment-intensive methods are available for the production of these proteins in commercial scale. The “trickle down” of these advanced molecular biology techniques to the average research laboratory means that virtually any graduate student can produce a recombinant protein or monoclonal antibody. Equipment readily available at large pharmaceutical companies are not practical in the academic research or startup biotechnology company laboratory. The search for a simple, cost-effective cell culture system has resulted in the birth of a new area of biotechnology: the use of bioreactor systems to grow cells on a large scale. A bioreactor based on hollow-fiber bundles is the ideal method for culturing 10 9 to 5 × 10 10 cells in any laboratory. This article describes the classic applications for hollow-fiber systems as well as some