Serum Free Cell Lines

An area of regulatory concern in the biopharmaceutical production industry is the use of animal derived products during production processes. One of the sources of this problem is the presence of animal derived components in the media (e.g. serum and growth factors) used to grow cell lines which produce the required product.

For years media manufacturers have produced media designed to support the growth of cell lines without the addition of serum and more recently in completely animal component-free/chemically defined media (Sigma-Aldrich) even to the extent of being peptide-free (Cell Culture Technologies). The lengthy adaptation process before such a media can be incorporated in a production process along with the unreliability of the early serum-free media have often been a barrier to change. For this reason and due to customer demand ECACC has been working with media suppliers to provide a range of common cell lines which have already been adapted to growth in serum and protein free media.

In addition to the regulatory concerns mentioned above removal of serum from cell culture offers many other advantages such as:

• Reduced process variability

• Removal of ill defined raw materials

• Removal of serum sourcing issues

• Reduced risk of allergic response in end product

• Produces a more reproducible system for studies into differentiation, regulation and proliferation

• Aids downstream processing of product

The table below lists cell lines currently available from ECACC adapted to growth in serum/protein free medium.