Whatever the used vaccine platform (inactivated virus, protein subunit, adenovirus vector, mRNA), upstream process development should aim to reduce the manufacturing cost while increasing the production yield.
Many factors should be taken into consideration while producing vaccines and are directly linked to the cell line. Hence, keeping this latter in its optimal state is a key factor to produce high amount of vaccines with good quality.
Example: virus amplification may be inhibited by key nutrients of cell culture and cumulative by-products such as lactic acid and ammonia. Isn’t it crucial, then, to study the changes in cell metabolism throughout the production and monitor the expression of genes that are implicated in glycolysis and nitrogen fixation?