The BioInsights Podcast

Four viral vector experts from diverse groups within Pall Corporation’s gene therapy manufacturing organization – Denis Kole, Jon Petrone, Marc Bisschops and Nathan Hazi – join BioInsights to share insights in hot topics for the field, including optimizing upstream process yield and titer, full/empty/partially full capsid separation, and platform process development.

Saadia Zakai and Mark Schofield of Pall join Hélène Lebas of leading viral vector CDMO, Yposkesi, to discuss key current trends and challenges in AAV and lentiviral vector manufacturing, with a particular focus on the cutting edge in lentiviral vector and adeno-associated viral (AAV) vector purification tools.

The tangential flow filtration (TFF) unit operation in viral vector manufacturing is a critical step on the path to commercialization. In this episode, Merck viral vector experts Ratish Krishnan and Akshat Gupta discuss best practices – and common misconceptions – when establishing process conditions and utilizing different TFF device formats.  

Professor Dimitrios Mougiakakos is the director of the Hematology and Oncology department at the Otto-von-Guericke University in Magdeburg, Germany. In this episode, he joins us to discuss the exciting potential for CAR T cell therapy for autoimmune disease and how his team has approached GMP manufacturing in the clinical setting. He explains the challenges faced in setting up cell therapy for systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), and the future of cell and gene therapy in different indications.

Cell and gene therapy scientists are under increasing pressure to achieve results faster and produce cells and cell products more cost-efficiently. Field applications scientists from their major suppliers can provide invaluable support, helping to optimize processes, utilize new platforms and technologies more effectively, and avoid costly errors. In this podcast, three veteran Field Applications Scientists from Corning Life Sciences - Austin Mogen, Catherine Siler, and Chris Suarez - share their expertise and lessons learned over decades of experience. 

Fatema Kazi works for the WHO, where she helps to assess the public health value of vaccine products and technologies in routine, campaign, and outbreak settings. We caught up with her to discuss how innovations in vaccine technology can help get vaccines to the people who need them.

In today’s challenging financial environment, it is more important than ever to get key biotech business decisions right first time. One of the most important and topical of these is the choice of CDMO partner. Dr Kim Watanabe, General Manager and Site Head for Patheon Translational Services, a part of the Thermo Fisher Scientific pharma services contract development and manufacturing organizational arm, joins BioInsights to share her advice and insights into optimizing outsourcing strategy.

Drug development is a costly and time-consuming process associated with a significant attrition rate in the clinic. Safety is an important factor in this, and is a particular issue for cell and gene therapies. A panel moderated by Dr John Maher of King’s College London and Leucid Bio, and featuring Dr Alastair King, Dr Francisca Neethling, and Dr Andrea Bisso, discuss this highly topical barrier to the further clinical and commercial success of the field.

What valuable experiences from first generation cell therapies can the industry carry forward and apply to other indications, such as solid tumors? In this episode, Sean Werner and Chris Brown explore the most important lessons the industry has gleaned from pediatrics, and how they can inform the future of cell therapy manufacturing.

Tom Foti (Vice President and General Manager of the Protein Business Unit, Aldevron) and Dr Kris Saha (Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Medical History and Bioethics, University of Wisconsin-Madison) discuss ongoing work in Dr Saha’s lab to harness different types of HDR templates in order to build cutting-edge systems with the potential to enable point-of-care cell and gene therapy manufacture.