Conventional Flow Cytometry has been limited in the use of fluorophores due primarily to spectral overlap of emission signals. Spectral Flow Cytometry captures the full emission spectrum of the fluorophores, creating Spectral Signatures for each fluorophore and significantly lessening the spectral overlap problem enabling 40+ marker analysis while maintaining high signal resolution. Conventional Flow Cytometers […]
Flow Cytometry is best known for its use in the research or clinical setting to monitor disease and treatment progression, and to study immune system interactions. However, flow cytometry is also a vital tool used by the pharmaceutical industry for drug development, clinical trials, and biologics manufacturing. As new treatments are developed for old and […]
The Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) is a nonprofit organization that develops and publishes standards that are accredited by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and are referenced in government regulations and international standards. As a volunteer-driven, membership-supported organization, CLSI promotes documents on a variety of specialty areas, from laboratory basics to quality management […]
Dendritic cells (DC) are specialized antigen-presenting cells and key mediators of immunity and tolerance. DC bridge the innate and adaptive immune systems. As innate immune cells, DC recognize and respond to pathogen associated molecular Patterns (PAMPS) and damage/ danger associated molecular patterns (DAMPS) through toll-like receptors (TLR). The role of DC in adaptive immunity is […]
Balancing rapidly evolving technology with financial reality or in other words “please don’t tell me my big fancy machine is obsolete.” As a general question, applicable to many situations in our current lives: what do we do when technology evolves so quickly that our expensive gadgets become obsolete (even though they still work), and the […]
T cell exhaustion is a state of dysfunction that arises during chronic infection and cancer. When exposed to persistent antigen and/or inflammatory conditions, T cell function falters and declines to the eventual state of exhaustion. T cell exhaustion was first described for CD8+ T cells and most studies have focused specifically on CD8+ T cells, […]
Flow cytometry is a widely used technology for simultaneous detection of several biomarkers at a single cell level. This quasi-quantitative approach permits the investigator to identify heterogeneity in a sample and make connections between related and unrelated cells. However, the use of flow cytometry has been largely limited to analysis of intra and extracellular proteins […]
What are MDSC and why are they important? Simply put, MDSC are pathologically activated myeloid cells. The name Myeloid Derived Suppressor Cell was first coined in 2007, and in the following years MDSC have become a focus of research and drug development programs. MDSC are a heterogeneous population of myeloid-derived cells consisting of myeloid progenitors, […]
Our immune system is in a constant “molecular arms race” to stave off pathogenic invaders that want take up residence in our bodies. This is a battle where the microbes may gain the upper hand for a time, only to be outmaneuvered by our immune cells (Jonas, 2019). For an immune cell, one strategy and […]
Why pigs? 2019 is the year of the Pig on the Chinese calendar, and pigs have been part of human history for a very long time. Pigs were domesticated independently in Europe and Asia ~9000 years ago from wild boar (Guiffra, 2000), and have been part of human agricultural practices since then. Because they […]