Morphotek Issued U.S. Patent for Generating Genetically Altered Antibody Producing Cell Lines With Improved Antibody Characteristic

Morphotek Inc. announced today the issuance of United States Patent 6,808,894 covering the generation of genetically enhanced antibody producer cell lines. The issued patent covers the use of the company's proprietary MORPHODOMA® platform technology that can rapidly evolve host cells expressing antibodies to yield sublines expressing variant gene products with enhanced binding affinity as well as cell lines with improved titer yields for scaleable manufacturing. The genetic diversity that can be generated by the MORPHODOMA® process can be applied to virtually any antibody production cell line, including hybridoma cells and standard manufacturing cell lines such as CHO and NSO. Morphotek's vast patent estate includes over 50 issued/filed patents in the U.S. and abroad.

Dr. Nicholas Nicolaides, President and Chief Executive Officer of Morphotek commented, "This is a dominant patent for protecting the use of our technology to develop high-affinity antibodies and high-titer production lines. The patent covers broad applications of this technology to accelerate the development of efficacious human, humanized or chimeric antibodies as well as the development of high-titer cells for scaleable manufacturing."

"The invention described in this patent outlines a very powerful application of our MORPHODOMA® process to generate genetic diversity within an existing antibody cell line to further optimize antibody affinity and/or the host cell line’s productivity," added Dr. Philip M. Sass, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. "It is one of several patents that cover the application of our morphogenics platform to generate novel therapeutics and corresponding high-titer manufacturing cell lines in an expeditious manner."

About Morphotek

Morphotek is a biotechnology company focused on the generation of proprietary organisms for product discovery and development. The Company has a validated and patented platform technology called morphogenics that rapidly enhances the natural process of genetic evolution within a targeted host to yield variants with novel, commercially important output traits. This versatile technology has been successfully applied to microbes, plants, and mammals to yield genetically diverse offspring that are suitable for pharmaceutical and agricultural product development in the areas of antibody and protein therapeutics, high-titer protein manufacturing, and drug target discovery. Morphotek also plans to launch an exciting new antibody platform for developing high-quality, fully human therapeutic antibodies that significantly reduces the royalty burdens associated with current technologies. Internally, Morphotek employs its morphogenics technology to develop optimized therapeutic antibodies for the treatment of cancer, inflammatory and infectious diseases. For further company information visit www.morphotek.com

For Information Contact:
Philip M. Sass, Ph.D.
Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer
Morphotek Inc.
610-423-6106, info@morphotek.com

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