ENHANCED PRODUCTION OF HUMAN MONOCLONAL-ANTIBODIES BY THE USE OF FRUCTOSE IN SERUM-FREE HYBRIDOMA CULTURE MEDIA

It was found that the production of human monoclonal antibodies (MoAbs ) by human-human hybridomas can be significantly enhanced by replacing glucose with fructose in the dish culture medium. Optimization of ini tial concentrations of fructose and glutamine, another influencing fac tor for MoAb production, enabled an enhanced production of human MoAb 2.1 times higher than that obtained using the conventional culture med ia employing glucose. It was shown by kinetic analysis that enhanced M oAb production at the optimum fructose concentration can be attributed to the retention of high specific antibody production rates and dimin ished time lag during the course of culture. These dish culture result s with fructose-containing medium were successfully applied to the con tinuous perfusion culture with a slight modification, where 2.9- and 1 .9-fold enhancements in specific antibody production rate and MoAb con centration, respectively, were attained as compared with the conventio nal glucose-containing medium. An inverse relationship was observed be tween the secreted concentrations of lactic acid and MoAb when the hyb ridoma was cultured in the media containing varying concentrations of fructose, i.e., the lower the lactic acid concentration, the higher th e MoAb production and vice versa, suggesting that fructose at appropri ate concentrations in the medium can serve as an alternative sugar for the efficient production of human MoAbs, with reduced pH shifts, for the serum-free culture of human-human hybridomas.