ASTARTE BIOLOGICS, LLC. Profile

The mission of Astarte Biologics, LLC is to develop unique immune cell products for use in studies of the immune system. By developing and providing well-characterized immune cells to researchers, Astarte Biologics aims to enhance programs in vaccine development, drug safety testing and infectious disease research.

We welcome input from our fellow scientists. Let us know what products you would like to see in our catalog by using the form on the company contact page. If there's a cell type you really need, consider contacting us about custom product development. In the meantime, we'll be developing stuff we think is interesting and important and we'll continue to provide you with cells, antigens and protocols that work.

In vitro response of Astarte Biologics’ negatively selected purified human T Cells in the presence of allogeneic antigen-presenting cells (APC).

Cryopreserved T cells offered by Astarte Biologics are purified from peripheral blood mononuclear cells by negative selection. The purity of our T cell products are confirmed for each lot by flow cytometric analysis. Furthermore, these T cells can be used in an in vitro assay directly after thawing.

Our featured T cells (lot no. 2817AP15) were tested for the magnitude of in vitro response to allogeneic stimuli by incubating them in the presence of several types of antigen-presenting cells (APC) from an allogeneic donor.  

The extent of T cell proliferation were measured using the flow cytometry-based method of labelling responder cells (T cells) with 5,6-carboxyfluorescein diacetate succinimidyl ester (CFDA-SE), which is converted to fluorescent 5,6-carboxyfluorescein succinimidyl ester (CFSE) inside the cells and covalently labels intracellular proteins.  When labelled cells divide, half of the labelled proteins are distributed to each daughter cell, resulting in a decrease in dye intensity and a peak that is shifted to the left on a histogram of CFSE fluorescence intensity. 

Figure 2 below incorporates proliferation data from each sample with different APC type and number.  It allows for a comparison of the capacity the different allogeneic APC to stimulate CD4+ T cell response.  The data clearly shows that mature DC are superior to immature DC and monocytes in stimulating an in vitro allogeneic response.