Quad partners with University of Massachusetts to evaluate performance of novel cell separation solution

Jan 18 2016

Studies demonstrate highly viable, pure and completely magnetic bead-free isolated T-Cell populations from human umbilical cord blood samples using MagCloudz™ Cell Separation Kit

The rapid growth of cell-based immunotherapy research has led to an increase in demand for methods to isolate specific immune cell populations from heterogeneous samples with high viability, purity and recovery efficiency. Quad Technologies ("Quad"), is meeting this need with its MagCloudz™ Streptavidin Cell Separation Kits and has partnered with The University of Massachusetts Medical School to evaluate the performance of its novel cell separation solution for the enrichment and purification of CD3+ T-cells from human umbilical cord blood.

The MagCloudz kit enables straightforward, scalable and fast separation of magnetic particle-free cells for applications including T-Cell purification and stem cell isolation, which are critical processing steps in immunotherapy and cell therapy workflows. The results of the study with The University of Massachusetts Medical School demonstrated a successful CD3+/CD45+ T-Cell enrichment from both peripheral and umbilical cord blood samples, with purity of the recovered T-Cell populations exceeding >95%. This high degree of purity, accompanied by high cell viability and the total absence of residual magnetic particles renders the MagCloudz-isolated T-Cells ideal for use in downstream translational applications.

Dr Michael Brehm, Associate Professor of Program in Molecular Medicine at the University of Massachusetts Medical School led the study using the MagCloudz kits and discussed the details of the study on a recent webinar supported by Nature entitled ‘Blood Derived T-Cell Enrichment Using a Purification Technology’. The webinar, which also includes an overview of the technology from Sean Kevlahan, CEO of Quad Technologies, can be viewed on demand at www.nature.com.

Sean Kevlahan, CEO of Quad Technologies commented:

Our collaboration with The University of Massachusetts was a great success and the results clearly demonstrated how our kits truly overcome the limitations of current approaches for cell separation including lengthy protocol times and poor recovery. We have had a great response from our Beta customers to the benefits that MagCloudz delivers and we are looking forward to helping translational research applications improve their cell separation workflow to achieve high quality cells on a scalable and easy to use platform.

Quad has also expanded its offering for the cell isolation workflow to include a magnetic stand that supports the magnetic cell separation steps of the MagCloudz kit workflow. The Q-Mag magnetic stand’s ergonomic design makes it suitable for manual use and enables the easy transport of samples during incubation and vortexing. The stand, which accommodates up to sixteen 1.5-2ml microcentrifuge tubes, is available to purchase at http://quadtechnologies.com/shop/.

Quad will be demonstrating the capabilities of the technology on Booth #220 at the Cell & Gene Therapy World Conference taking place from January 25-27, 2016 in Washington, DC. Sean Kevlahan will be delivering a presentation on the capabilities of MagCloudz during the “Technologies of Tomorrow” showcase theater.

In 2016, the team at Quad Technologies plans to expand its collaborative reach with new partnerships focused on technology development and refinement for applications critical to regenerative medicine and immunotherapeutic areas.