High yield sterile filtration process for highly concentrated lentiviral vectors

Abstract

The development and manufacture of biopharmaceuticals are subject to strict regulations that specify the required minimum quality of the products. A key measure to meet these quality requirements is the integration of a sterile filtration step into the commercial manufacturing process. Whereas common procedures for most biologics exist, this is challenging for lentiviral vector (LVV) production for ex vivo gene therapy. LVVs nominal size is more than half the pore size (0.2 µm) of filters used for sterile filtration. Hence, highly concentrated virus solutions are prone to filter clogging if aggregation of viruses occurs or impurities attach to the viruses. Several filters were screened aiming to identify those which allow filtering highly concentrated stocks of LVVs of up to 1E + 9 transducing units mL⁻¹, which corresponds to 4.5E + 12 particles mL⁻¹. In addition, the effect of endonuclease treatment upstream of the purification process on filter performance was studied. In summary, three suitable filters were identified in a small‐scale study (<15 mL) with virus yields >80% and the process was successfully scaled‐up to a final scale of 100 mL LVV stock solution.