Viragen Announces That OVA(TM) System Results are Published in Leading U.S. Scientific Journal
Viragen, Inc.
(Amex: VRA; VRA.U; VRA.WS) and its collaborative partners in the field of
avian transgenics, Roslin Institute and Oxford Biomedica Plc (LSE: OXB),
today announced that the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of
the United States of America (PNAS), a leading scientific journal, has
published an article profiling the OVA(TM) System's ability to express two
therapeutic proteins in the whites of eggs of transgenic hens. The OVA(TM)
System is being developed as a novel, large-scale biomanufacturing
alternative capable of cost-effectively expressing many types of
therapeutic proteins.

The article, entitled, "Oviduct-specific expression of two therapeutic
proteins in transgenic hens," reports on the production of two protein drug
candidates: a humanized monoclonal antibody being developed by Viragen for
advanced malignant melanoma; and interferon beta-1a, which is currently
marketed under two competing brand names for the treatment of Multiple
Sclerosis (MS), as Avonex(R)* (Biogen Idec) and Rebif(R)** (Serono).

Article Summary:
Recent advances in avian transgenesis have led to the possibility of
utilizing the laying hen as a production platform for the large-scale
synthesis of pharmaceutical proteins. Ovalbumin constitutes more than half
of the protein in the white of a laid egg, and expression of the ovalbumin
gene is restricted to the tubular gland cells of the oviduct. Here we
describe the use of lentiviral vectors to deliver transgene constructs
comprising regulatory sequences from the ovalbumin gene designed to direct
synthesis of associated therapeutic proteins to the oviduct. We report the
generation of transgenic hens that synthesize functional recombinant
pharmaceutical protein in a tightly regulated tissue-specific manner,
without any evidence of transgene silencing after germ-line transmission.
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