
Using Flow to Improve Clinical Relevance in Blood Brain Barrier Models
Kirkstall’s Quasi Vivo® system aims to establish and optimise a human in vitro 3D Blood Brain Barrier (BBB) in an effort to identify important mechanistic pathways for successful biomarker analysis, drug delivery and toxicity testing.
ASSESSMENT OF BLOOD BRAIN BARRIER MODELS IN QUASI VIVO®

- Blood Brain Barrier models are required for research into drug delivery
- Existing in vitro tests do not accurately mimic the physiological environment of the in vivo interaction between the blood and the brain tissue. One important missing factor is the presence of interstitial flow on both sides of the cell membrane.
- Kirkstall’s Quasi Vivo® system allows the application of physiologically relevant flow rates.
COMPONENTS
- Quasi Vivo® QV600 chambers and accessories: tubing, reservoir bottles.
- Parker 2 head peristaltic pump ( 6 head also available)
- Cell types used to model BBB interaction:
- Human Brain Microvascular Endothelial Cells (HBECs);
- Human Brain Vascular Pericyte Cells (HBVPs);
- Human Brain Astrocyte Cells (HAs).


DIAGRAM OF THE BBB MODEL IN A QV600 CHAMBER


MTT ASSAY COMPARING HBVPs & HBECs UNDER DIFFERENT MEDIA CONDITIONS AND WITH FLOW
Our BBB model, consisting of conditioned medium and flow is therefore ideal for these two cell types. Data taken from Miranda-Azpiazu P., Panagiotou S., et al. A novel in vitro 3D blood brain barrier model for comprehensive drug permeability and toxicity testing.
Paper presented at: Advances in Cell and Tissue Culture; 15/06/15; Pisa, Italy.

CONCLUSION
Quasi Vivo® is compatible with many 3D cell culture protocols, and can be integrated into your laboratory with ease. This advanced in vitro technique is physiologically relevant, making your data more applicable to the human situation.
Quasi Vivo® used in 100+ labs worldwide, getting started is easy and cost effective
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