Review Paper Validates KIYATEC 3D Cell Culture Technology and Approach

Brigitte Altmann¹, Alexander Welle¹, Stefan Giselbrecht¹, Roman Truckenmüller², Eric Gottwald¹ really hit the nail on the head with their recent review paper, “The famous versus the inconvenient - or the dawn and the rise of 3D-culture systems.” World Journal of Stem Cells, December 2009.

¹ Institute for Biological Interfaces, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
² MIRA Institute for Biomedical Technology and Technical Medicine, University of Twente, The Netherlands

The authors’ conclusions validate the approach KIYATEC has embraced from day one:

The superiority of dynamic scaffold perfusion for 3D cell culture.

Insights from the review include (italicized text is quoted directly from the review):

     Recognition of the inherent limitations of static culture conditions in hydrogels … 

gel-based systems without any forced medium flow are limited to rather small setups, at least in one dimension, as exemplified by several thin gel sandwich constructs or very low densities of cells with low metabolism

     … and even in porous 3D-matrices based on sponge-like structures.  

Experiments in our laboratory with the hepatoma cell line HepG2 in alginate sponges revealed that, despite a larger pore size compared to hydrogels, mass transport between sponge and culture medium was limited in stationary culture conditions.

     These limitations lead to the logical outcome that …

Micro-bioreactors specifically designed for 3D cell culture [i.e., with active nutrient and gas supply] provide an opportunity to overcome these mass transfer limitations in high density cell cultures

     … and perhaps more importantly:

Bioreactors based on perfused scaffolds show a better nutrient supply compared to the above mentioned systems [i.e., stirred flasks like spinner-flask or rotating-wall vessel (RWV) bioreactors, fluidized or fixed bed bioreactors, and hollow-fiber bioreactors] since cells immobilized on 3D-matrices are in direct contact with the culture medium.

The authors provide an excellent synopsis of the current state of 3D cell culture:

• Commercially available 3D-culture systems comprise mainly sponges (e.g., collagen or calcium-phosphate sponges), hydrogels made of natural polymers like alginate or extracellular matrix components or more rare synthetic peptide hydrogels and cell culture flasks coated with nanofibers representing a synthetic substrate for cells in monolayer culture.
  
  

• All these systems are designed for stationary culture in multiwell cell culture plates, while available fluidic 3D-culture systems using bioreactors are based on encapsulated cells or cells immobilized on microcarriers in rotating bed/wall vessel bioreactors displaying in part the already discussed limitations. 
  
  

• Many standardized techniques for cell analysis used so far in conventional monolayer culture, like cell lysis for mRNA or protein extraction, immunostaining or quantification of secreted proteins into the culture medium, are often difficult to transfer to 3D-culture systems, especially in gel-based systems as gels often hinder the accessibility of the cells.

Based on all of these points, we are very excited about KIYATEC’s value proposition: 

Cost effective, injection molded, tissue culture polystyrene 3D cell culture chambers that are easy to use and integrate the best aspects of traditional 2D cell culture devices, including common/standardized techniques for cell analysis. 

Although KIYATEC 3D Cell Culture Chambers are not yet commercially available, they will be shortly.  
In the meantime, KIYATEC is actively signing up test labs for product evaluation.

Stay tuned!