title: Improvement of the primary metabolism of cell cultures by introducing a new cytoplasmic pyruvate carboxylase reaction.
abstract: Continuous mammalian cell lines are important hosts for the production of biological pharmaceuticals. However, these cell lines show some severe disorders in primary metabolism, which they have in common with many cancer cells. This leads to a high throughput of substrates giving a low energy yield and ample toxic side products such as lactate and ammonia. Because the enzymatic connection between glycolysis and the tricarboxylic acid cycle (TCA) is very poor, glucose is mainly degraded via oxidative glycolysis. It will be shown that introducing a pyruvate carboxylase gene expressed in the cytoplasma into a continuous BHK-21 cell line, and thus reconstituting the missing link between glycolysis and TCA, can reduce this problem. Thus, glucose consumption could be reduced by a factor of four and glutamine utilization up to a factor of two, compared with control. Moreover, a 1.4-fold-higher adenosine triphosphate (ATP) content was achieved. The flux of labeled [(14)C]-glucose into the TCA is shown to be enhanced, indicating a higher rate of oxidative glucose degradation. Host cell lines with an improved energy metabolism will therefore result in better exploitation of substrates, an increasing yield by the more efficient use of carbon source, and higher product integrity combined with lower production costs.
authors.affiliation: Department of Cell Culture Technology, Gesellschaft fur Biotechnologische Forschung mbH, Mascheroder Weg 1, D-38124 Braunschweig, Germany.
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Irani
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Wirth
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: van Den Heuvel
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Wagner
mesh_terms: D000255:Adenosine Triphosphate / Q000378:metabolism; D000818:Animals; D001709:Biotechnology; D018929:Cell Culture Techniques / Q000379:methods*; D002455:Cell Division; D002460:Cell Line; D002952:Citric Acid Cycle; D006224:Cricetinae; D003593:Cytoplasm / Q000378:metabolism; D004274:DNA, Recombinant / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D004734:Energy Metabolism; D005285:Fermentation; D015870:Gene Expression; D005800:Genes, Fungal; D005947:Glucose / Q000378:metabolism; D010084:Oxidation-Reduction; D010101:Oxygen Consumption; D011766:Pyruvate Carboxylase / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism*; D012441:Saccharomyces cerevisiae / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics; D014162:Transfection
chemical_list: D004274:DNA, Recombinant; D000255:Adenosine Triphosphate; D011766:Pyruvate Carboxylase; D005947:Glucose