Current late-stage attrition models are not predictive enough for selection of safe and effective drug candidates. To prevent issues, a lot of work is required late in the clinical development stage. Because of this, Pluriomics wants to use human stem-cell technology in biopharmaceutical research and development.
Human stem-cell technology could increase the efficiency of drug discovery by selecting novel and safe candidates early on in the research and development stage. It also reduces animal experimentation and personalizes drug discovery and development.
Pluriomics’ pluricyte cardiomycytes are cryopreserved human iPSC-derived cardiomycytes. They are cryopreserved in various formats to suit the needs of different applications. The cells are manufactured and cultured in a chemically defined media, then supplied in a kit format together with a bottle of pluricyte cardiomycyte medium.
The chemically defined maturation medium is optimized for the cardiomycyte and promotes structural and functional maturation. The medium allows highly reproductible culture from vial-to-vial and from batch-to-batch.
Other advantages of the pluricyte cardiomycytes include being characterized by immunofluorescent imaging and electrophysiology and displaying all relevant biological functions, including important ion channels INa, ICaL, IKr, IKs and so on.
The pluricyte cardiomycytes are mostly ventricular myocytes, meaning they differentiated from human-induced pluripotent stem cells. They express relevant cardiac markers, such as troponin T (>70%) and MLC2v (>60% troponinT-positive cells) and show highly organized, aligned sarcomere structures.
Within 24 hours after thawing, the cardiomycytes start to beat. Around day 3, post-plating an entire population forms electrically connected monolayers that beat synchronically. Around day 7, the rates of the monolayers are between 20 to 40 BPM and therefore, can be easily paced for electrophysiological research.
The implementation of the cardiomycytes in safety pharmacology would be between the preclinical transition and the first phase. It would cost around $335M total.
Pluriomics’ pluriocyte cardiomycyte’s extensive quality control ensures cell quality and has optimized culture procedures for various assays, including calcium transients, viability and metabolism, contraction, trans membrane action potentials, ion channel currents, impedance and field potential. Scalable production of the cardiomycytes allows large lot sizes with minimal batch-to-batch variation.