Solutions

The brain has always been the most intriguing part of the body. The diseases and conditions related to the brain have been a mystery for a very long time, even though significant advancements have been made in neuroscience. There is collaborative work to find solutions for debilitating diseases that affect the body's central nervous system. Stellixir Biotech team is well-equipped with the best infrastructure and research scientists. We help our clients with several services to develop therapies and bring substantial weightage to your research program.

BBB Model: Monitor Cell-Cell Interactions Between Vascular and Brain Cells

Discovery Services:

• Real-time drug permeability across the BBB.
• Neurotoxicity on the cells of the BBB.
• Evaluate drugs that have a protective effect on the BBB
• Investigate the effects of tumor cells on the BBB
• Evaluate inflammatory effects on the BBB
• Biomarker Analysis
• Visualize and quantify the migration of immune cells
• Genomic, proteomic, and metabolic analysis of normal and dysfunctional BBB.

Models Available:

• Monoculture with brain endothelial cells
• Co-Culture with brain endothelial cells and astrocytes
• Tri-Culture with brain endothelial cells, astrocytes, and pericytes

Neurodegenerative Diseases: Alzheimer's and Parkinson's Disease

Neurodegenerative diseases are severely debilitating conditions characterized primarily by progressive neuronal loss and impairment of the nervous system. Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases are the most common neurodegenerative disorders, and their impact is increasing as average life expectancy increases worldwide. Cell models that resemble the characteristics of the disease are important in drug discovery projects because they provide information about the therapeutic benefits of drugs under development. At Stellixir, we provide in vitro cell models to study the molecular basis of Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease focusing on their potential for discovering of disease-modifying therapeutics to combat neurodegenerative diseases. We also offer phenotypic screening as an important approach for identifying novel therapeutic molecules. Our cell-based assays for drug discovery ranges from simple monoculture cell models to high-throughput three-dimensional cell models.

Discovery Services

• Tau levels/ clearance assays
• Toxic Aβ1-42 peptide exposure
• LDH release measurement
• NeuN cell viability assay
• Alpha-synuclein aggregation quantification
• Neuronal mitophagy assays (Tom20 Loss Quantification)
• Cytoprotective assays

Available In-Vitro Model

• Rodent primary mixed cortical neurons
• Rodent primary hippocampal neurons
• Rodent primary midbrain-TH-enriched neurons
• Human potassium ion channel expressing cell lines
• Human M1 Muscarinic Acetylcholine Receptor (GPCR) Cell Lines
• Human NMDA receptor Cell lines
• Human post-mortem microglia cultures
• hiPSC-derived cortical neurons
• Human M5 Muscarinic Acetylcholine Receptor (GPCR) Cell Lines
• Human ReNcell VM and SH-SY5Y cell lines with dopaminergic features
• Rodent and human astroglial & microglial cell cultures
• Human iPSCs derived brain cells
• Human NSCs
• 3D Organoids of neuronal cell lines

Neuro-Inflammation:

Neuroinflammation is now recognized as a critical process in different neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, stroke, multiple sclerosis, etc... Astrocytes and microglia are key players in neuroinflammation since they release wide variety of proinflammatory mediators, including nitric oxide, cytokines and chemokines. Target validation, complex cellular screening, mechanism of action studies and early translational biology research complete the breadth of activities performed by the Stellixir team in in vitro cell based models and assays.

Discovery Services:

• Lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced inflammation
• Nitric oxide production
• Microglia activation
• Macrophage activation
• Phagocytosis Assays
• Human microglia assays: cytokine release & calcium imaging
• Neuronal and microglial inflammation assays
• Microglial activation & phagocytosis studies
• Neuro-Glia co-cultures studies
• Cytokine release assays
• LPS-induced inflammation
• Neurite outgrowth assays

Available Models:

• Adult murine microglia
• iPSC-derived astrocytes/ neurons
• Murine cortical glial and mixed cultures
• Human microglial cultures
• Human Potassium & Sodium ion channel expressing cell lines

Techniques Used: Flow Cytometry, Confocal/Fluorescence Microscopy (Multi-colour Immunofluorescence), ELISA (Fluorimetry/Colorimetry), RTqPCR, WB.