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news.ZenBio, a privately held biotechnology company and provider of research tools for the study of human metabolic disease, has said that it will be a commercial source for the murine 3T3-L1 cell line, which has been elementary in metabolic disease research for years.
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The 3T3-L1 system, which was originally derived from Swiss mouse embryo tissue by Dr Howard Green of the department of cell biology at Harvard Medical School, has been crucial in improving the understanding of basic cellular mechanisms related to diabetes, obesity and other associated disorders.
3T3-L1 is a cell line derived from 3T3 cells that is used extensively in research on adipose tissue, making the line important for metabolic disease research studies. 3T3-L1 cells have a morphology that resembles fibroblasts, but under the right conditions the cells will differentiate into a phenotype that mimics the behavior of adipocytes. The 3T3-L1 in vitro system has proven to be a very useful complement to primary human adipocyte cultures.
The company will offer low passage cryopreserved and cultured forms of 3T3-L1 cells with optimized media formulations to improve growth and survival rates in culture. Furthermore, the company will provide contract research services customized to the 3T3-L1 in vitro system.
These capabilities will include assay development, compound screening, conditioned media delivery, gene expression profiling and further 3T3-L1 characterization. The company will also offer optimized metabolic research kits to measure various outputs from 3T3-L1 assays, including insulin-stimulated glucose uptake, lipolysis and triglyceride accumulation.
ZenBio, to help make it easier for its HTS/HCA partners to incorporate 3T3-L1 cells into their screening programs, will also provide large-scale, pre-plated cell cultures for use in automated screening projects on a custom basis. A range of SBS-approved plate formats and flask cultures will be available.
Peter Pieraccini, president of ZenBio, said: “The 3T3-L1 cell line is an excellent addition to our portfolio of human primary cell products and assays. Metabolic disease research has the potential to provide solutions to widespread, serious health problems, and we are committed to continuing to lead in offering cell-based solutions for researchers.”