earticle

영어

In 'solid-phase' PEGylation, the conjugation reaction occurs as the proteins are attached to a solid matrix, and thus it can have distinct advantages over the conventional, solution-phase process. We report a case study: rhIFN-α-2a was first adsorbed to cation exchange resin and then N-terminally PEGylated by aldehyde mPEG of 5, 10, and 20 kD through reductive alkylation. After the PEGylation, salt gradient elution efficiently recovered the mono-PEGylate in a purified form from the unwanted species such as unmodified IFN, unreacted PEG, and others. The mono-PEGylation and its purification were integrated in a single chromatographic step. Depending on the molecular weight of the mPEG aldehyde used, the mono-PEGylation yield ranged 50-64%. We could overcome the major problems of random, or uncontrollable, multi-PEGylation and the post-PEGylation purification difficulties associated with the solution-phase process. N-terminal
sequencing and MALDI-TOF MS confirmed that a PEG molecule was conjugated only to the N-terminus. Compared with the unmodified IFN, the mono-PEGylate showed the reduced anti-viral activity as measured by the cell proliferation assay. The bioactivity was reduced more as the higher molecular weight PEG was conjugated. Immunoreactivity, evaluated indirectly by antibody binding activity using a surface plasmon resonance biosensor, also decreased. Nevertheless, trypsin resistance as well as thermal stability was considerably improved.

한국어

혈액 내 순환시 안정성 향상과 면역원성의 감소를 위해, rhIFN-α-2a은 N-terminus의 α-아민기에 mPEG aldehyde를 solid-phase PEGylation 시킨다. CM-Sepharose와 같은 양이온 교환수지가 고체 지지체로 사용되었다. Mono-PEGylate는 양이온 교환 수지에서 unmodified 단백질과 분리되어 용출된다. Sitespecific PEGylation과 mono-PEGylate의 분리가 한 단계의 공정으로 얻어진다는 점은 solid-phase PEGylation의 이점을 뒷받침해준다. 위치 특이성은 peptide digest의 질량 분석과 Edman
degradation을 이용한 N-terminal sequencing에 의해 확인하였다.
Mono-PEGylate는 항바이러스 활성과 면역원성의 감소를 나타내고, 감소 정도는 결합되는 mPEG의 분자량에 비례한다. Trypsin 저항성과 온도 안정성은 mono-PEGylation에 의해 두드러지게 개선되었다. Solid-phase PEGylation을 통해 종래의 액상 반응에서 나타날 수 있는 재현성 낮은 반응, 부 반응물 생성, 부 반응물 제거 공정 등의 단점을 극복할 수 있었다. 그러나 solid-phase PEGylation의 문제점인 액상 반응에 비교하여 많은 양의 PEG를 사용하여야 한다는 점은 개선되어야 한다.