Process for the measurement of the potency of glatiramer acetate

A process for preparing glatiramer acetate acceptable for pharmaceutical use which comprises

• a) measuring the potency of a batch of glatiramer acetate relative to the potency of a reference batch of glatiramer acetate by:
• i) immunizing a female (SJLXBALB/C)F1 mouse with a predetermined amount of glatiramer acetate from the reference batch;
• ii) preparing a primary culture of spleen T-cells from the female (SJLXBALB/C)F1 mouse of step (i) at a predetermined time after immunization;
• iii) separately incubating at least two reference samples, each of which contains a predetermined number of cells from the primary culture of step (ii) and a predetermined amount of glatiramer acetate from the reference batch;
• iv) incubating at least two samples, each of which contains a predetermined number of cells from the primary culture of step (ii) and a predetermined amount of glatiramer acetate from the batch of glatiramer acetate;
• v) determining for each sample in steps (iii) and (iv), the amount of a cytokine secreted by the cells in each sample after a predetermined time period of incubation of such sample;
• vi) correlating the amounts of the cytokine secreted by the samples incubated with the batch of glatiramer acetate with the amounts of the cytokine secreted by the samples incubated with the reference batch of glatiramer acetate so as to determine the potency of the batch of glatiramer acetate relative to the reference batch of glatiramer acetate,
• wherein in each sample in steps (iii) and (iv) the predetermined number of cells is substantially identical, and wherein for each sample containing a predetermined amount of glatiramer acetate from the batch of glatiramer acetate there is a corresponding reference sample containing a substantially identical predetermined amount of glatiramer acetate from the reference batch;
• and
• b) qualifying the batch of glatiramer acetate as acceptable for pharmaceutical use if the relative potency of the batch of the glatiramer acetate is between 80% and 125% of the potency of the reference batch, thereby preparing glatiramer acetate acceptable for pharmaceutical use.