CellShip: An Ambient Temperature Transport and Short-Term Storage Medium for Mammalian Cell Cultures

Buick, Emma; Mead, Andrew; Alhubaysh, Abeer; Bou Assi, Patricia; Das, Parijat; Dayus, James; Turner, Mark; Kowalski, Lukasz; Murray, Jenny; Renshaw, Derek; Farnaud, Sebastien

Abstract

Cell culture is a critical platform for numerous research and industrial processes. However, methods for transporting cells are largely limited to cryopreservation, which is logistically challenging, requires the use of potentially cytotoxic cryopreservatives, and can result in poor cell recovery. Development of a transport media that can be used at ambient temperatures would alleviate these issues. In this study, we describe a novel transportation medium for mammalian cells. Five commonly used cell lines, (HEK293, CHO, HepG2, K562, and Jurkat) were successfully shipped and stored for a minimum of 72 hours and up to 96 hours at ambient temperature, after which, cells were recovered into standard culture conditions. Viability (%) and cell numbers, were examined, before, following the transport/storage period and following the recovery period. In all experiments,
cell numbers returned to pretransport/storage concentration within 24–48 hours recovery. Imaging data indicated that HepG2 cells were fully adherent and had established typical growth morphology following 48 hours recovery, which was not seen in cells recovered from cryopreservation. Following recovery, Jurkat cells that had been subjected to a 96 hours transport/storage period, demonstrated a 1.93-fold increase compared with the starting cell number with >95% cell viability. We conclude that CellShip may represent a viable
method for the transportation of mammalian cells for multiple downstream applications in the Life Sciences
research sector.

Citation

Buick, E., Mead, A., Alhubaysh, A., Bou Assi, P., Das, P., Dayus, J., …Farnaud, S. (in press). CellShip: An Ambient Temperature Transport and Short-Term Storage Medium for Mammalian Cell Cultures. Biopreservation and Biobanking, https://doi.org/10.1089/bio.2023.0100

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Dec 28, 2023
• Online Publication Date: Dec 28, 2023
• Deposit Date: Mar 22, 2024
• Publicly Available Date: Apr 9, 2024
• Journal: Biopreservation and Biobanking
• Print ISSN: 1947-5535
• Electronic ISSN: 1947-5543
• Publisher: Mary Ann Liebert
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1089/bio.2023.0100
• Keywords: Cell Biology; General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology; General Medicine; Medicine (miscellaneous)