Western Blots using Quasi Vivo®

Many of our customers often think that there wont be enough protein content in cells cultured in a Quasi Vivo® chamber to perform many of the analytical techniques, including Western blots.

We spoke to Quasi Vivo® user Esther Johann who works for Merck, about how she found doing Western blots. Esther is a final year PhD student who is comparing different flow models to create an improved liver model. After initial research she chose to develop the model with Quasi Vivo®.

How did you find comparing 2D and 3D samples in Quasi Vivo®?

In comparison to 2D, the Quasi Vivo® samples have much higher expression (of tested proteins). In comparison to 3D, it depends on time point. Sometimes it looks like expression of some proteins is fluctuating, but I would need more time points to really understand this.

 What end points have you been able to look at with Quasi Vivo®?

The only end point I’ve used so far is protein isolation and Western blots, because it was a nice way to compare the different cell culture systems.

Every system requires different amounts of cells, etc, so it is difficult to find an end point that suits them all. So I decided to use the total protein amount, because I gathered a large amount of protein.

Did you manage to make any Western blots from your cells cultured in Quasi Vivo®?

Yes of course, it’s very easy actually!

If you would like to read our full chat with Esther about flow systems and using Quasi Vivo® please click here

Esther uses QV900 chambers, HepaRG cells and two flow rates, 250 µl min-1 and 500 µl min-1.