3D Cell Culture Assay

About

About this innovation The need for better in vitro screening technology is well known and documented in the field. The currently used 2D cell assays are fast and easy to perform, but lack predictive value. Among the various 3D culture platforms, 3D ECM-embedded cell spheroids most closely represent the in vivo tumour microenvironments. However, several technical hurdles preclude the use of such cultures in high content screening (HCS): i) spheroid creation is difficult and poorly reproducible; ii) it is restricted to certain cell types; and iii) spheroid location cannot be carefully controlled, which hampers automated imaging. Scientists have developed an automated method to create 3D ECM-embedded cell spheroids that overcomes these limitations. Spheroid formation time is strongly reduced compared to other methods (minutes rather than days) and it can be applied to a broad range of cell types including cells which naturally do not form cell-cell contacts, endothelial cells, various cancer cell lines, and primary tumour cell suspensions. For High Content Screening, we are able to produce 1 spheroid per well in 384 well plates or up to 7 patterned spheroids per well in 96 well plates. Importantly, the spheroids have defined x-y-z spatial coordinates allowing automated confocal imaging and image analysis algorithms. A successful proof-of-principle chemical screen was done on breast cancer spheroids identifying compounds affecting cancer cell invasion/migration.  Key benefits Fast Robust Exact location of spheroids is known Automated Proof of principle has been established Application Cell culturing Tissue engineering High Throughput drug screening Cancer / Tumour research