Molecular Devices and STEMCELL Technologies said they have a developed a validated automated workflow that can be used with STEMCELL’s IntestiCult™ Plus organoid growth medium for human intestinal organoids culture on the Molecular Devices CellXpress.ai automated cell culture system.
Available as a downloadable protocol, the workflow provides researchers with a ready-to-implement approach to automating organoid culture, helping reduce hands-on time and experimental variability while enabling more consistent, scalable generation of human-relevant research models and accelerating discovery, according to an official at Molecular Devices.
The workflow marks the first milestone in a strategic collaboration to automate STEMCELL’s portfolio of organoid culture kits on the CellXpress.ai system. By combining STEMCELL’s expertise in organoid biology with Molecular Devices’ automation capabilities, the companies aim to help researchers more easily adopt and scale human-relevant models, reducing barriers to implementation and accelerating research workflows in laboratories worldwide, explained Mary Duseau, president of Molecular Devices.
Under the collaboration, Molecular Devices develops and validates automated workflows, while STEMCELL provides tissue-specific science for performance criteria and cell-based functional characterization to support protocol development and validation.
“Organoids have the potential to give researchers a more human-relevant view of disease and treatment response, but their broader use depends on making these models easier to implement at scale,” continued Duseau. “This collaboration is an important step toward giving more scientists practical access to advanced cellular models while freeing them to focus on the biological questions that can inform the development of better therapies.”
The workflow reportedly enables automated culture, monitoring, and analysis of human intestinal organoids within a standardized process on the CellXpress.ai system. Researchers can implement the validated protocol as provided or adapt it to meet specific experimental requirements, providing flexibility for a range of organoid research applications, noted Allen Eaves, PhD, president and CEO of STEMCELL Technologies.
“This collaboration helps make advanced organoid workflows more accessible to scientists working across drug discovery, disease research, and translational biology,” he said. “Together, we’re enabling researchers to combine well-established organoid culture systems with automation, supporting the adoption of new approach methodologies (NAMs) and making it easier to generate reproducible results and scale their work as research needs evolve.”
The companies plan to evaluate additional organoid models and workflows for automation on the CellXpress.ai system, creating a portfolio of validated applications for drug discovery, disease modeling, toxicology, and translational research.
