Corning adds Biological Industries' xeno-free stem cell medium to portfolio
The deal will see Mediatech, a life sciences subsidiary of Corning, add NutriStem human pluripotent stem cell (hPSC) medium to its bioprocessing supplement portfolio in a deal described as “an important milestone” by the developer and manufacturer of the product, Israel-based Biological Industries.
“Many recent publications have concluded that NutriStem hPSC Medium out-performs other commercially-available media when used with new culture technologies and applications,” Tanya Potcova, CEO of Biological Industries USA told Biopharma-Reporter.com.
“The scientists at Corning also found NutriStem hPSC Medium to be the best fit for their new matrices, providing better and more efficient results after screening the other popular media on the market.”
Corning’s subsidiary will market and distribute the product worldwide, after the firms launch the jointly-branded NutriStem hPSC XF Medium later this year, but financial details were not provided.
However, Biological Industries (BI) will continue to manufacture the medium from its GMP-certified facilities in Israel and China.
“The product undergoes rigorous quality control evaluation, including functional testing by BI’s in-house stem cell scientists to validate its support of pluripotent hPSC growth and proliferation,” Potcova told us.
Xeno-free
The standard for comparison within the stem cell field is Stemcell Technologies’ mTeSR1, Potcova continued, which was the very first medium developed for feeder-free culture of hPSCs.
While this was a breakthrough supplement and allowed researchers to culture hPSCs without the influence of a feeder cell co-culture for the first time, the product is not xeno-free and contains high levels of proteins and growth factors.
Nutristem is xeno-free and without the need for serum/serum-replacement, co-cultured feeder cells, or the addition of high levels of proteins or growth factors. This offers stem cell manufacturers a number of advantages, Potcova said.
“Undefined components, such as serum, human or mouse feeder cells, and even Matrigel matrices, can be highly variable in quality and composition from lot to lot, which introduces unwanted variables with each passage.”
Furthermore, she continued, “undefined components can cause unreproducible data and dramatic variation in cell health, growth, and behavior depending on the materials used.
“The incorporation of reagents from animal sources may not only interfere with any downstream clinical regulations, but pose the more immediate risk of contamination from mycoplasmas and dangerous viruses, etc.”
