Park Sungje, Shin Seunghyeon, Han Gyucheol, Lee Gyun Min
Department of Biological Sciences, KAIST, Daejeon, Republic of Korea.
Graduate School of Engineering Biology, KAIST, Daejeon, Republic of Korea.
Biotechnol J. 2025 Jan;20(1):e202400529. doi: 10.1002/biot.202400529.
Increasing demand for adeno-associated virus (AAV) used in gene therapy highlights the need to enhance AAV production. When intracellular AAV2 and extracellular AAV9 were produced in HEK293T cells using the triple transfection method, apoptosis occurred during the AAV production. To mitigate apoptosis induced by AAV production, the pro-apoptotic BAX/BAK1 genes were knocked out in HEK293T cells. BAX/BAK1 knockout (BBKO) in HEK293T cells significantly increased the production of both AAV2 and AAV9. For AAV2, BBKO increased the genome titer of AAV2 by 55% without negatively affecting the proportion of unwanted empty capsids generated during AAV production. Empty capsid ratios were determined based on viral genome and capsid titers and confirmed via transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Likewise, for AAV9, BBKO increased the genome titer of AAV9 by 66% without negatively affecting the proportion of empty capsids. Additionally, as assessed using a transduction assay, BBKO increased the functional titers of AAV2 and AAV9 by 30% and 46%, respectively. Therefore, BBKO increased AAV production, while maintaining full capsid ratio and infectivity. Taken together, BBKO proved to be an efficient method for enhancing AAV production in HEK293T cells for both AAV2 and AAV9.
基因治疗中对腺相关病毒(AAV)需求的增加凸显了提高AAV产量的必要性。当使用三重转染法在HEK293T细胞中产生细胞内AAV2和细胞外AAV9时,在AAV产生过程中发生了细胞凋亡。为了减轻AAV产生诱导的细胞凋亡,在HEK293T细胞中敲除了促凋亡的BAX/BAK1基因。HEK293T细胞中的BAX/BAK1基因敲除(BBKO)显著提高了AAV2和AAV9的产量。对于AAV2,BBKO使AAV2的基因组滴度提高了55%,且未对AAV产生过程中产生的不需要的空衣壳比例产生负面影响。空衣壳比例是根据病毒基因组和衣壳滴度确定的,并通过透射电子显微镜(TEM)进行了确认。同样,对于AAV9,BBKO使AAV9的基因组滴度提高了66%,且未对空衣壳比例产生负面影响。此外,通过转导试验评估,BBKO使AAV2和AAV9的功能滴度分别提高了30%和46%。因此,BBKO提高了AAV产量,同时保持了完整衣壳比例和感染性。综上所述,BBKO被证明是一种在HEK293T细胞中提高AAV2和AAV9产量的有效方法。