Increasing Vaccine Production Using Pulsed Ultrasound Waves

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

11-27-2017

Abstract

Vaccination is a safe and effective approach to prevent deadly diseases. To increase vaccine production, we propose that a mechanical stimulation can enhance protein production. In order to prove this hypothesis, Sf9 insect cells were used to evaluate the increase in the expression of a fusion protein from hepatitis B virus (HBV S1/S2). We discovered that the ultrasound stimulation at a frequency of 1.5 MHz, intensity of 60 mW/cm2, for a duration of 10 minutes per day increased HBV S1/S2 by 27%. We further derived a model for transport through a cell membrane under the effect of ultrasound waves, tested the key assumptions of the model through a molecular dynamics simulation package, NAMD (Nanoscale Molecular Dynamics program) and utilized CHARMM force field in a steered molecular dynamics environment. The results show that ultrasound waves can increase cell permeability, which, in turn, can enhance nutrient / waste exchange thus leading to enhanced vaccine production. This finding is very meaningful in either shortening vaccine production time, or increasing the yield of proteins for use as vaccines.

Comments

© 2017 Xing et al.

A link to freely available content has been provided.

Publication Title

PloS One

Published Citation

Xing, Jida, Shrishti Singh, Yupeng Zhao, Yan Duan, Huining Guo, Chenxia Hu, Allan Ma, Rajan George, James Z. Xing, Ankarao Kalluri, Isaac Macwan, Prabir Patra, and Jie Chen. “Increasing Vaccine Production Using Pulsed Ultrasound Waves.” PloS One. 12, no. 11 (November 27, 2017). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0187048.

DOI

10.1371/journal.pone.0187048

Peer Reviewed

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