New paper by BioThrust: 𝗡𝗞-𝟵𝟮 𝗰𝗲𝗹𝗹 𝗺𝗮𝗻𝘂𝗳𝗮𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗯𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗵𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗸 𝗮𝘁 𝟮𝗟 𝘀𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲!

The bioprocess experts from BioThrust Yasemin van Heuvel, Valentin von Werz and the group of Oliver Spadiut at Technische Universität Wien and the team at SimVantage released this publication on NK-92 cell manufacturing.

The team collaborated to compare our ComfyCell bioreactor with a conventional pitched-blade stirred-tank bioreactor (2 L scale). While both systems supported comparable growth, viability, and metabolic profiles, the difference in function was significant:

• NK-92 cell line expanded in the ComfyCell system showed significantly higher cytotoxicity.
• Computational fluid dynamics revealed that a more homogeneous shear environment likely preserves and enhances cell function.

𝗞𝗲𝘆 𝘁𝗮𝗸𝗲𝗮𝘄𝗮𝘆: 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗱𝗲𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻 𝗱𝗼𝗲𝘀𝗻’𝘁 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗰𝘁 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻, 𝗶𝘁 𝗱𝗶𝗿𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗹𝘆 𝗶𝗻𝗳𝗹𝘂𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲𝘀 𝗰𝗲𝗹𝗹 𝗽𝗼𝘁𝗲𝗻𝗰𝘆!

This work highlights a scalable bioreactor strategy for producing highly functional NK cells, supporting the advancement of allogeneic, off-the-shelf cell therapies!

Congratulations to everyone involved, we believe this is yet another clear example of why BioThrust`s ComfyCell bioreactor is ideally suited to cost-efficient commercial manufacturing of sensitive cells.

Download the paper here

Abstract

The immortalized NK-92 cell line is widely used to study natural killer (NK) cell biology and develop immunotherapies. NK-92 cells exhibit strong cytotoxic activity against tumor and virus-infected cells and are often used as a functional surrogate for primary NK cells. Beyond research applications, NK-92 cells are currently being evaluated in clinical trials as an allogeneic, off-the-shelf cell therapy. NK cells are typically cultured in static systems, which limits scalability. For clinical and commercial applications, large-scale cell expansion requires scalable platforms, such as bioreactors. However, conventional bubble-aerated bioreactors generate shear stress and foam, which can impair proliferation during prolonged culture and compromise cell quality. To address these limitations, a membrane-based stirring and aeration system was compared to a conventional pitched-blade impeller with microsparger aeration in 2 L stirred-tank bioreactors. NK-92 cells were expanded from static pre-cultures into shake flasks and subsequently inoculated into each bioreactor with continuous feeding to maintain ideal nutrient supply. Both systems supported comparable growth, viability, and metabolic profiles. Cells showed comparable growth, viability and metabolism profile in both systems. However, cells expanded in the membrane-based system exhibited markedly higher cytotoxicity and cytotoxic capacity. Computational fluid dynamic simulations of both systems suggest that this observation is likely attributable to the more homogeneous shear distribution in the membrane-stirred setup compared to the pitched-blade configuration. Overall, this work presents a novel cultivation method to produce highly cytotoxic NK-92 cells in a well scalable stirred-tank bioreactor platform for allogeneic off-the-shelf cell therapy.