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 initial concentrations of fructose and glutamine, another influencing factor for MoAb production, enabled an enhanced production of human MoAb 2.1 times higher than that obtained using the conventional culture media employing glucose. It was shown by kinetic analysis that enhanced MoAb production at the optimum fructose concentration can be attributed to the retention of high specific antibody production rates and diminished time lag during the course of culture. These dish culture results with fructose-containing medium were successfully applied to the continuous perfusion culture with a slight modification, where 2.9- and 1.9-fold enhancements in specific antibody production rate and MoAb concentration, respectively, were attained as compared with the conventional glucose-containing medium. An inverse relationship was observed between the secreted concentrations of lactic acid and MoAb when the hybridoma was cultured in the media containing varying concentrations of fructose, i.e., the lower the lactic acid concentration, the higher the MoAb production and vice versa, suggesting that fructose at appropriate 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.