Cell culture enables the study of biological process and the discover of new drugs and biomaterials outside of the body. However, culturing cells in 2-D is not always predictive of what cells do in 3D (inside the body). There is a need to make 3D cell models (which are harder to prepare) to enable predictive screening to predict outcomes in the body, without (or before) resorting to animal models. In our latest work we have developed a method to cryopreserve spheroids - 3-D assemblies of cells which are more predictive of physiological outcomes than normal 2D monolayers. We achieved this using our macromolecular cryoprotectants which mitigate cold damage by mechanisms that traditional cryoprotective agents dont address. We show that liver-cell spheroids can be recovered in high yield, are healthy and respond to drugs (i.e. toxicity testing) the same as fresh spheroids.

This work is important, as spheroids are known to be more predictive than 2D cell monolayers but the barrier to researchers to use them is high, developing the techniques and handling of the cells. By developing this method to freeze them, the spheroids can be prepared, banked and easily shared as a frozen product. This work was conducted in collaboration with our Biotech spin-out Cryologyx Ltd.

Read the paper here

Cryopreservation of Liver-Cell Spheroids with Macromolecular CryoprotectantsLink opens in a new window