Cyntellect launches Stem Cell Colony Purification Application

Cyntellect, Inc., a privately-held life sciences company commercializing products to advance the study of cell biology, stem cell research, biopharmaceutical production, and drug discovery, announced today the commercial availability of its Stem Cell Colony Purification Application powered by the LEAP™ Cell Processing Workstation. An important addition to Cyntellect's Stem Cell Manager suite of software already consisting of automated passaging and uniform embryoid body generation tools, this latest application has been developed to address current limitations in stem cell colony purification, and is a major advancement over existing methods.

“Human embryonic and induced pluripotent stem cells, and their differentiated progeny, represent high value cell types that investigators need to purify for use in various studies. The ability of LEAP to directly work with these intact cell colonies provides significant advantages to stem cell researchers.”

The Stem Cell Colony Purification Application meets a significant need for purifying cells which grow in complex colonies by directly processing the cells in situ, eliminating the need for disaggregating the cells as required by other techniques. Most conventional approaches (e.g., flow cytometry, magnetic beads, etc.) require that the desired cells be physically dislodged and disaggregated, often leading to irreversible changes in cell function and/or decreased cell survival, particularly with sensitive cells like human stem cell lines.

"The Stem Cell Colony Purification Application marks a considerable step forward in stem cell research tools," said Dr. Fred Koller, Cyntellect's Chief Technology Officer. "Human embryonic and induced pluripotent stem cells, and their differentiated progeny, represent high value cell types that investigators need to purify for use in various studies. The ability of LEAP to directly work with these intact cell colonies provides significant advantages to stem cell researchers."

The application features purification of specific colonies from a complex starting cell population, purification of stem cell colonies without removal from cultures or other perturbations, an iterative process that allows downstream elimination of cells that spontaneously differentiate or lose engineered expression, and easy tracking of desired colonies from initial purification to final outgrowth.

LEAP operates through laser-mediated in situ elimination of undesired cells without physically disturbing the cells that are preserved. LEAP has been used for high-throughput laser-mediated cell elimination for general cell purification, as well as purification of cells based on direct measurement of antibody secretion by individual cells. Further, LEAP purification can be efficiently performed on small samples with very low cell numbers, providing unmatched purity and yield of cells.

SOURCE Cyntellect