A study of the THP-1 cell line as the potential biologics production platform with the emphasis on serum-free media substitution for economic expediency

Cell cultures are frequently preferred in the industrial production of high value-added biopharmaceuticals on a large scale. In the production of biopharmaceuticals, the selection of the appropriate cell line, the cell culture medium, and the culture conditions are very important. In medical products to be offered for human use, authorized institutions do not allow the use of serum which increases the culture yield, added to the culture. For this reason, the cell lines to be used must be adapted to the serum-free medium. In this study, first, the direct and gradual adaptation of the THP-1 cell line, which has a high potential for use in biopharmaceutical production, to a locally produced chemically defined serum-free medium was carried out. Then, a comparison of the production efficiency in the shake flasks with the commercially available two different serum-free media was performed. Finally, for the first time, THP-1 cells were produced in spinner flasks and stirring tank bioreactor to simulate the large scale within the scope of this work.