Acting and reacting in life science biotechnologies
Decidedly, producing and purifying a protein is a form of art.
Indeed, each recombinant protein (rec. protein) to be produced in vitro has specific characteristics and singularities that make its production and purification most definitely challenging. In this post, I’d like to share and review a few tips and basics for optimal design of experiment when producing functional recombinant proteins and working on protein purification.
By mimicking in-vivo environments, 3D cell culture models appear nowadays as the best in-vitro study model to work in an in-vivo like study model and to obtain more physiologically relevant data and proof of concept as close as possible to “a clinical context”.
3D cell culture chip – AIM Biotech
To accompany researchers along this way, there are several innovative cell culture devices (available in Europe through tebu-bio), and more specifically a modular microfluidic platform for 3D cell culture with the capability to monitor complex biological systems dynamics in response to tuned microenvironment: the 3D Cell culture chip (Aim Biotech) [Read more…]
Control of food intake. Human hormones. Leptin, insulin and Ghrelin. Leptin and the regulation of energy balance.
If your research is related to obesity and adipose tissue, you may be interested by the selection I have performed below of immunoassays (including ELISA tests and antibody arrays), as well as primary cell models related to this topic.
Obesity and the diseases arising from it (diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer) constitute a major health challenge to the industrialized world. In the past decade, it has become apparent that adipose tissue is a major endocrine organ which secretes numerous soluble factors and regulates many processes related to glucose homeostasis, lipid and protein metabolism, inflammatory and immune responses… [Read more…]
These new test systems (Pooled Human Liver S9 and cytosol) have been prepared from tissue treated to preserve high Aldehyde Oxidase (AO) and Xanthine Oxidase (XO) activity, yet without significantly impacting major cytochrome P450 (CYP) activity. [Read more…]
Following the start of our recent collaboration with Phenocell, we’re pleased to be able to provide high quality Sebocytes developed from Human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC). Thanks to a perfectly standardized reprogramming protocol, they display lower batch to batch variability, allowing better reproducibility and accuracy of your experimental results. [Read more…]
Human Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells (hPBMCs) are essential for designing cellular models to be used in cell therapy and drug discovery research programs [1-7, 12]. Being able to access reliable and ethical sources of well-characterized hPBMCs is now becoming fundamental for running physiologically relevant cell-based assays. A good opportunity to discuss the expanding applications for hPBMCs in drug development, that Patricia Bresnahan, PhD (Global Marketing Director at HemaCare Corporation) has observed over the last years.
In a recent publication, researchers from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine (USA) describe that Serotonin released by human beta cell inhibits glucagon secretion by alpha cells. They demonstrated that this paracrine loop was mediated via the cAMP pathway. To do so, they captured in live human pancreatic islet cells cAMP signals using a specific fluorescent biosensor.
Understanding how mammalian cells function requires a dynamic perspective. Recent improvements in our abilities to perform fluorescence microscopy on primary cells, coupled with advances in pipelines for quantifying and extracting data, have made possible a better understanding of the temporal complexity of cell signalling pathway. Due to the heterogeneity seen in both eukaryotic and prokaryotic cell populations, study at the single cell resolution with living cells is currently the best solution to understand the dynamics between environmental conditions and cellular behaviour.
However as living cells don’t stay still, classical imaging and studying methods present some drawbacks for single cell analysis and tracking such as: [Read more…]
Analyte quantification (in pg/ml or ng/ml) such as IL-6, TNFalpha and numerous other proteins is conveniently performed with immunoassays called ELISA kits. At tebu-bio, we not only provide more than 10 000 ELISA kits but we also support researchers through our techserv team who are on-hand to suggest the best kits and to answer any questions.
Being part of that team, I have noticed a number of often asked questions that can be resumed in one : What is the best method for data analysis? [Read more…]
The Ras-Raf-MEK-ERK Pathway is an important cell signalling route with many implications for cancer biology and therapeutic development. Dis-regulation of some of this pathway’s proteins expression and phosphorylation status are observed in about one-third of all human cancers. Access to specific tools to study this pathway is essential to a better understanding of its role in cancer for novel drug development. If you are working on this topic, you’ll be interested in taking a look at the range of reagents on offer for a wide variety of applications.