Publications by authors named "Marcus W W Hartmann"

Article Synopsis
  • Antibody glycosylation plays a crucial role in improving antibody therapeutics, and this study focuses on producing the anti-cancer monoclonal antibody rituximab using the unicellular ciliate Tetrahymena thermophila.
  • The produced antibody showed increased efficacy in antibody-dependent cell-mediated cytotoxicity due to unique N-linked glycosylation patterns, including afucosylated and oligomannose-type glycans.
  • Analyses suggest that the glycosylation structures in the ciliate closely mimic human glycoproteins and demonstrate potential for large-scale production of monoclonal antibodies with enhanced therapeutic properties.
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Development of effective malaria vaccines is hampered by the problem of producing correctly folded Plasmodium proteins for use as vaccine components. We have investigated the use of a novel ciliate expression system, Tetrahymena thermophila, as a P. falciparum vaccine antigen platform.

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Background: Tetrahymena thermophila possesses many attributes that render it an attractive host for the expression of recombinant proteins. Surface proteins from the parasites Ichthyophthirius multifiliis and Plasmodium falciparum and avian influenza virus antigen H5N1 were displayed on the cell membrane of this ciliate. Furthermore, it has been demonstrated that T.

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Background: Tetrahymena thermophila is one of the best characterized unicellular eukaryotes and its genome is sequenced in its entirety. However, the AT-richness of the genome and an unusual codon usage cause problems in cloning and expression of the ciliate DNA. To overcome these technical hiatuses we developed a Cre-dependent recombinase system.

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Background: Dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR) and thymidylate synthase (TS) are crucial enzymes in DNA synthesis. In alveolata both enzymes are expressed as one bifunctional enzyme.

Results: Loss of this essential enzyme activities after successful allelic assortment of knock out alleles yields an auxotrophic marker in ciliates.

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Background: The non-pathogenic ciliate Tetrahymena thermophila is one of the best-characterized unicellular eucaryotes used in various research fields. Previous work has shown that this unicellular organism provides many biological features to become a high-quality expression system, like multiplying to high cell densities with short generation times in bioreactors. In addition, the expression of surface antigens from the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum and the ciliate Ichthyophthirius multifiliis suggests that T.

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Background: Over the last decades molecular biologic techniques have been developed to alter the genome and proteome of Tetrahymena thermophila thereby providing the basis for recombinant protein expression including functional human enzymes. The biotechnological potential of Tetrahymena has been proved in numerous publications, demonstrating fast growth, high biomass, fermentation in ordinary bacterial/yeast equipment, up-scalability, existence of cheap and chemical defined media. For these reasons Tetrahymena offers promising opportunities for the development of a high expression system.

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