Critical assessment of current adeno-associated viral vector production and quantification methods

Abstract

Adeno-associated viral vectors have emerged as one of the most studied vectors for gene therapy. Numerous production methods have been described, each with its advantages and disadvantages. A challenge in assessing the current state of the art exists in comparing yields from one production system to the next due to the wide variety of quantification techniques. In this review, AAV vector production methods are summarized and the yields of the different processes are standardized to the number of harvested cells. Titers are further streamlined into five categories: transduction units, enhanced transduction units, infectious particles, DNase-resistant particles and total particles, and the importance of each type of measure is discussed.