The Benefits of Using a Digital Cell Imager

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Andrea Corona: Hi, everyone, and welcome to Biocompare's Tech Insights podcast, where we speak to scientific experts about new tools and technology that could help advance your research.

I'm Andrea Corona, associate editor here at Biocompare, and today's guest is Kim Italiano, product manager for the Millicell^® Digital Cell Imager. And she's going to be talking to us about how digital cell imaging can help achieve greater consistency in your cell cultures. Thank you for joining us today, Kim.

Kim Italiano: Thank you for having me.

Andrea Corona: So, my first question for you is, can you please start off by briefly describing how and why researchers typically culture adherent cells?

Kim Italiano: Cell culture is the basic tool to investigating translational research questions and is used for in vitro modeling of biological processes or diseases. So, typically a researcher would culture cells in a cell culture vessel such as a T-flask using cell culture medium. A common media includes DMEM supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum.

Once the cells are around 70% confluent, which is when they're ready, the cell line is dependent, or grown to cover roughly 70% of the bottom of the flask for adherent cells, they're ready to expand into either a larger vessel or additional vessels. And this process is called cell passaging, and it may happen several times until you get enough cells.

But ultimately, researchers can use these cells to investigate the biological process or disease of interest in vitro. This can be in any form of an in vitro assay, for example.

Andrea Corona: What would you say are the main drawbacks of this approach?

Kim Italiano: It's a very manual and repetitive approach to culturing cells. So, one will move from an incubator to a microscope to the hood, back to the microscope, etc. Assessing cell confluency by looking into a traditional inverted microscope is a very subjective approach, and also it's thought as very superstitious at times as well.

Andrea Corona: So, with that in mind, how do digital cell imagers provide more consistent cell culture, and why is this important?

Kim Italiano: Sure. So, a digital cell imager allows researchers to assess confluency more accurately and more consistently by removing the subjectivity of traditional methods. Digital cell imagers use an algorithm to calculate the amount of space that is covered within the vessel by cells.

This not only helps individual researchers with the consistency, but it also allows for consistency from end-user to end-user. So, passaging cells at a consistent percent confluency will allow researchers to grow cells consistently. This is especially important for hard to culture cells.

Andrea Corona: And can you suggest any other benefits of digital cell imagers?

Kim Italiano: The connectivity of sharing data, saving this information, archiving the information into the cloud will not only help researchers, but it also helps the organization and lab leads. For when there are personnel changes, it also helps PIs track and view how projects are progressing from beginning to end. Cell culture cores have the ability to show cell culture images and confluency numbers at the time of handing off to another lab.

So being able, again, to remove that subjectivity and put a true number based on an algorithm not only adds to the reproducibility of data, but also helps train new lab members, and it's really changing the way that we view cells today.

Andrea Corona: Thank you. My last question for you is, could you please highlight some key features of the Millicell^® DCI and explain the advantages these bring to cell-based research?

Kim Italiano: Sure. So, the Millicell^® DCI has a small footprint, so it's similar to the size of bench space that the traditional microscope would occupy. It allows for a two-click image capture, so it's allowing researchers to assume their normal routine of looking at their cells and quickly assessing them.

However, the Millicell^® DCI now allows them to quickly take an image. They don't have to rely on memory or a number that they wrote a piece of paper or a napkin. It's also connected wirelessly or also through Ethernet to allow for instant data transfer, so there's no need to download the information to a USB and transfer it to its final destination.

And like I said earlier, it removes that subjectivity of assessing confluency measurements, and thus reducing user bias, providing accurate and fast results. It also has that function to count total cells on a hemocytometer and quickly average and calculate cells per mil based on whatever dilution factor was done as well.

Andrea Corona: Well, thank you, Kim, for sharing all this information with us and taking the time to speak with me.

Kim Italiano: Thank you so much.

Andrea Corona: For a more in-depth description of the Millicell^® Digital Cell Imager, please read the related article, "Greater Cell Culture Consistency with Digital Cell Imaging." And thank you for listening. For more information on products, technologies, and the latest scientific advancements, please visit Biocompare.com. And have a great day.