Sukhanya Jayachandra, Ph.D., Senior Research Investigator and head of the Cellular Resource Group, Lead Discovery Profiling Compound Management at Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS), discusses her cell culture core facility.

Problem: Contamination in cell culture is a time-consuming, costly and ongoing problem. Research can be invalidated, valuable cell lines lost and weeks and even months of work ruined.

Microvolume assessment of bacterial culture growth was found to facilitate measurement of undiluted cultures. Comparison between microvolume and cuvette-based data requires the use of a conversion factor, which can be simply determined.

Ralph Garippa, Ph.D., independent consultant and former head of cell-based high-throughput screening (HTS) and microscopic imaging-based high-content screening (HCS) at Hoffmann-La Roche, discusses the recent trends in cell culture.

A few of the essential dos and donts of cell culture are mandatory; e.g. use of personal protective equipment (PPE). Many of them are common sense and apply to all laboratory areas. However some of them are specific to tissue culture.

Dr. Peter Hodder, senior scientific director and head of Lead Identification Division at The Scripps Research Institute in Florida, talks about his experiences moving from big pharma to academia to set up a high-throughput screening laboratory from the ground up.

TTP LabTech has developed both bead- and cell-based fluorescence methods for the screening of antibodies against soluble and cell surface antigens.

Showing movies in 3-D has produced a box-office bonanza in recent months. Could viewing cell behavior in three dimensions lead to important advances in cancer research? A new study led by Johns Hopkins University engineers indicates it may happen. Looking at cells in 3-D, the team members concluded, yields more accurate information that could help develop drugs to prevent cancers spread.