Vaccine Production: State of the Art and Future Needs in Upstream Processing

The production of viral vaccines in animal cell culture can be accomplished with primary, diploid, or continuous (transformed) cell lines. Each cell line, each virus type, and each vaccine definition requires a specific production and purification process. Media have to be selected as well as the production vessel, production conditions, and type of process. Here, we describe different issues that have to be considered during virus-production processes by discussing the influenza virus production in a microcarrier system in detail as an example. The use of serum-containing as well as serum-free media, but also the use of stirred tank bioreactors or wave bioreactors, is considered.