Syllabus
Introduction to protein therapeuticals: review of current and future market, ways of approval. Modern methods of recombinant protein expression: overview, choosing the right expression host.
Cloning with and without restriction endonucleases. Prokaryotic expression systems: pros and cons, news and techniques.
Eukaryotic expression systems: yeast, protozoa, plant expression systems and insect cells. Protein production in mammalian cell lines: stable and transient transfection, selection and yield improvement, cell line engineering.
Monoclonal antibodies and their recombinant fragments. Hormones, cytokines, other small therapeutics.
Recombinant vaccines: boons and risks. New alternative protein binding scaffolds: (not only) alternatives to antibodies.
Therapeutic protein modifications: conjugation with polymers, solid phase depot formulation, administration issues of protein solutions, protein radioconjugates.
Annotation
Lecture presents the topic of therapeutic proteins as a new branch of biopharmaceuticals gaining growing interest as a tool in diagnostics and treatment of cancer, hormonal disorders and vaccination. It deals mainly with modern techniques of recombinant protein expression (including practical tips) and gives an overview of structural and functional classes of protein therapeuticals with a special regard to new and alternative protein binding scaffolds. A separate chapter is devoted to the protein modification, conjugation and administration issues.
A special interest is given to practical examples - each lecture contains besides the part from the main topic also a part describing one example of a therapeutically used protein, with review of its research, development and current usage.
Lectures are delivered in Czech to Czech students. For Erasmus students the lectures are in English. Depending on the number of students enrolled the course can be arranged as lectures or in another way (colloquium, consultations).