Pu·MA System 3D for Automated Organoid Assays, In Situ Sampling and In Situ Imaging

Introduction

3D cell models and organoids provide a better representation of in vivo tissue or organ function. For the last three decades, researchers have been perfecting the formation and maintenance of various 3D models for understanding both disease and normal physiology (1-3). Some of the limiting factors have been the ability to perform complex assays easily and quickly with these precious samples especially patient-derived material. Also, when manually performing drug treat-ments and assays in 96-well plates, one is limited by the number of readouts per sample. The manual treatment, staining, and processing of spheroids and organoids is typically labor-intensive and prone to disrup tion or loss of samples.

In this application note, we report the use of our microfluidic-based Pu·MA® System to perform automated assays using 3D cell models. The spheroids in this study HeLa (cervical carcinoma line) and HepG2 (hepatocyte carcinoma line) were incubated with and without com-pounds for 24−48 hours in the Pu·MA System. After drug treatments, the spheroid media was collected for secreted factor analysis. The spheroids were then stained and imaged within the flowchips using a confocal microscope. Other cell viability measurements or downstream analysis can be performed.