Entries by Thomas Gabrielczyk

New tools to support AAV manufacturing

With the rapid developments in the field of gene therapy, the use of viral vectors, especially AAV, to treat various monogenic, inherited diseases in human patients is gaining momentum. Nonetheless, there are still options to optimise the production of such vectors in mammalian cells.

Merck aquired AmpTec to expand mRNA capabilities

This year, Merck KGaA Darmstadt, Germany has acquired AmpTec, an internationally active
contract manufacturing company (CMO) with comprehensive services for manufacturing of synthetic RNAs and mRNAs and more than 15 years of experience, with cGMP compliant manufacturing capabilities in development. This marks an exciting new chapter, where our combined expertise will allow us to offer our customers innovative technologies and products to help advance life-enhancing therapeutics.

PBMC isolation in global clinical trials

In clinical trials of new drugs and vaccines, the analysis of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) is increasingly recognized as a valuable tool to get insight into the cellular immune response. These data can be used as surrogates in clinical trials for evaluation and market authorisation of new prophylactic or therapeutic vaccines. The collection of the drawn blood and its transport to an isolation lab is a logistical challenge that requires sophisticated procedures and diligent oversight.

TheraVision – an oncolytic virus platform technology

Since virus immunotherapies have the potential to improve therapy responses, we established a platform technology based on Herpes Simplex Virus Type 1 (HSV1). TheraVision constitutes a complete development pipeline including a proprietary HSV1 engineering vector for the modular integration of transgenes, a GMP-compliant production process, and complex preclinical test systems including human tumour and immune cells to demonstrate sensitivity and safety.