Coexpression of acidic fibroblast growth factor enhances specific productivity and antibody titers in transiently transfected HEK293 cells

Recombinant proteins are of great commercial and scientific interest. However, most current production methods using mammalian cells involve the time- and labor-intensive step of creating stable cell lines. Although production methods based on transient gene expression could offer a significant improvement, transient transfection is currently still limited by low titers and low specific productivity compared to stable cell lines. To overcome these bottlenecks, we have explored the use of various growth factors to enhance specific productivity and titers in the context of transient gene expression. For that purpose, several growth factors were cloned and screened for their effect on transient gene expression in HEK293E and CHO-DG44 cells. In particular, acidic fibroblast growth factor (aFGF) was able to increase specific productivity by 60% and recombinant protein titers by 80% in HEK293E cells, while FGF9 increased titers by 250% in CHO-DG44 cells.