Essi M. Niemi1, Jonathan Sheard1, Tony Kiuru1 and Piia Mikkonen1
1UPM Biomedicals, Helsinki, Finland
In precision medicine, it is essential to develop biologically relevant and physiologically tissue mimicking, but costeffective and experiment-reproducible cell models. 3D spheroid/organoid culture methods with hydrogels have become a powerful tool for examination of better in vivo relevancy compared to well-established 2D monolayer models. However, due to the complexity of 3D models, usually these are challenging to scale-up for automated highthroughput workflows. The selection of suitable hydrogel with ease-of-use and repeatability is essential towards developing automation friendly 3D models.
GrowDex®, GrowDex®-T and GrowDex®-A are made from birch-based nanofibrillar cellulose and ultrapure water and have shown to provide biocompatible ECM-like support matrix for development of various clinically relevant healthy and cancerous cell models for drug discovery and development. The hydrogels are well-defined and animalfree, shear thinning and temperature stable which makes them ideal to work with various pipetting robots and dispensers for automated and scalable 3D models, with a possibility of direct biochemical and image-based cell assays.