[Construction of CHO-IVB, A serum-independent, apoptosis-resistant cell line that can grow in adherence].

Without serum to provide adherent factors, CHO-dhfr- cells grow in suspension when cultured in serum-free medium. Although this offers advantages in some applications, in most production systems adherent cell growth is preferable. Gene transfection, clonal selection and amplification can be easier for adherent cells; the density of immobilized cells is often higher than those in suspension culture, which results in a higher protein productivity; washout of cells by perfused medium during continuous fermentation can be avoided; for high-throughput microplate assays, adherent cells are preferred to facilitate medium changes and cell washing. It has been proved that purified vitronectin alone was able to mediate attachment and spreading of CHO cells in serum-free medium. So we constructed a tricistronic expression vector expressing Igf-1, Vitronectin and Bel-2 at the same time. The vector was transfected into CHO-dhfr- cells and one clone, namely CHO-IVB2, expressing high level of the three proteins was screened out by Western blot. The cell line showed similar apoptosis-resistant and serum-independent properties to CHO-IB, an engineered cell line constructed before. When cultured in IMEM protein-free medium without any components supplemented, CHO-IVB can grow adherently. The viable cell numbers and growth rate of CHO-IVB were much higher than CHO-IB, making CHO-IVB an apoptosis-resistant host for production of recombinant proteins which can grow adherently in protein-free medium.