Role of arginine in development of biopharmaceuticals

Abstract

Production, formulation and characterization of proteins play a major role in biotechnology industries. We have shown that aqueous arginine solution increases the solubility of proteins in formulation and purification, suppresses aggregation during refolding and storage and improves performance of column chromatography. Acidic arginine solution now finds application for virus inactivation. I will summarize these various effects of arginine on proteins and viruses and describe the current knowledge of the mechanism of the effects of arginine. © 2010 The Pharmaceutical Society of Japan.