PROGEN - Viral Vector Production for Gene Therapy and Functional Genomics

The PROGEN vector development laboratory provides services and advice for researchers in academia and industry. Our viral vector development and production service can start with cloning your gene of interest into an Adeno-Associated Virus (AAV) or adenovirus vector system and will lead you all the way through production and quality control. We deliver ready-to-use vectors for administration in tissue culture and animal experiments. We are currently involved in several projects with industry partners.

PROGEN also manufactures and distributes ELISA tests for quantification of AAV and various monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies specific to the capsid and replicase of AAV.

PRODUCTION OF VARIOUS AAV SEROTYPES AND QUALITY CONTROL

Adeno-associated virus can be used as a non-pathogenic gene shuttle for gene transfer into a broad range of mammalian cells with high efficiency. Long term expression and low immunogenicity are a major advantage of the AAV system. These factors make it attractive for gene therapy and functional genomics research.

As different AAV capsids exhibit different infectivity in various tissues and cell lines, we offer custom tailored AAV serotypes for the various issues. PROGEN can advice you which capsid will work best in your assay system and package your gene of interest into different capsid serotypes of AAV (Serotype 1-5).

ADENOVIRUS PRODUCTION AND QUALITY CONTROL

Adenovirus Type 5 has an extremely broad host range and will infect dividing and non-dividing cells. The virus provides high level gene expression of inserts up to 8 kb. Due to the immune response, the expression will not last for long time. However this can be an advantage e.g. in the case of cancer therapy.

PROGEN manufactures recombinant adenovirus. Its services include cloning of the gene of interest, production, and purification as well as quality control. We also provide custom tailored assays as a service for investigators or industry.

MULTIMETRIX - ASSAY DEVELOPMENT ON THE LUMINEX PLATFORM

The LUMINEX™ XMAP™ technology allows the simultaneous quantitative measurement of up to 100 different parameters in a single sample performed under chemical equilibrium conditions.

PROGEN founded MULTIMETRIX GmbH, a company developing immunserological tests and DNA tests on the Luminex Lx-100 platform. The MULTIMETRIX service laboratory in Heidelberg develops custom tailored assays for academia and industry.

PHAGE RECOMBINANT ANTIBODY TECHNOLOGY

PROGEN manufactures and distributes hyperphages. By using hyperphage technology, the number of Single-Chain Antibody Fragments (scFv) presented on filamentous phage particles generated with antibody display phagemids can be increased by more than two orders of magnitude (Nat Biotechnol. 2001, 19:75-8).

A license for the hyperphage technology for industrial research is available through PROGEN from its partner BTMS GmbH.

PROGEN offers also various tools for genomic research such as Immunoglobulin G (IgG) and Immunoglobulin M (IgM) primer sets for amplification of the human antibody coding regions as well as baculovirus expression cassettes for the expression of the recombinant antibodies.