New System helps CRO with Protein Analysis using Resonant Mass Measurement

Coriolis Pharma has become the first pharmaceutical contract research organisation in the world to routinely use Archimedes, a new analytical instrument supplied by Malvern Instruments. Coriolis Pharma specialises in formulation development for biopharmaceuticals such as proteins, peptides and vaccines and offers a wide variety of services to support product development.

Archimedes is a new system that uses the technique of resonant mass measurement (RMM) to detect and accurately count particles from 50nm to 5µm in diameter, and to measure their buoyant mass, dry mass and size. It has applications in the quantitative characterisation of protein aggregates in the size range currently of new regulatory interest, from 0.2µm to 2µm diameter, where aggregates are considered to have a high likelihood of eliciting an unwanted immune response. Uniquely for this size range, Archimedes distinguishes between proteinaceous material and contaminants such as silicone oil.

“The teams at Coriolis Pharma have extensive expertise in protein analysis, especially in the field of protein aggregation and degradation, and were early to recognise the benefits of applying resonant mass measurement within our formulation development regimes,“ said Dr Andrea Hawe, CSO from Coriolis Pharma. “Our pioneering testing and adoption of the highly innovative Archimedes now enables us to more easily measure protein aggregates and silicone oil droplets in a critically important size range. This has added a new dimension to our protein characterisation capabilities and to the service we provide for our clients."

In the July 2013 issue of the Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences, scientists at Coriolis Pharma, together with colleagues at Leiden University in The Netherlands and Ludwig Maxmilians University in Germany, published a paper reporting work using RMM and micro-flow imaging to examine the quantitative differentiation of protein particles and silicone oils over a large size range.

Distinguishing between these two entities is pertinent to the development of biopharmaceuticals. The high accuracy of discrimination using Archimedes for different types of protein particles, and different ratios of protein particle to silicone oil droplets, and also the robustness of the technique were all attributed to the straightforward categorisation of particles and droplets according to buoyant mass.