Plasticell, the biotechnology company developing regenerative drugs using high throughput stem cell technologies, has announced the publication of a book chapter which presents the case for combinatorial methods in stem cell research.

The chapter by Dr. Yen Choo, Plasticell’s founder, is entitled ‘Use of Combinatorial Screening to Discover Protocols That Effectively Direct the Differentiation of Stem Cells’ and appears in ‘Stem Cell Research and Therapeutics’ (Y. Shi and D.O. Clegg, Eds), published by Springer Science & Business Media.

The publication draws a parallel between stem cell differentiation and protein engineering which is used to produce commercially useful molecules such as zinc fingers and antibodies. While both disciplines rely on empirical experimentation to discover optimal biological solutions, the more mature field of protein engineering has progressed largely due to combinatorial screening methods. It is argued that similar cell biology methods could revolutionize the stem cell field.

Plasticell’s ‘Combinatorial Cell Culture’ (Combicult™) is a combinatorial screening method for cell biology with applications in stem cell differentiation. The method allows cost- and time- efficient testing of very large numbers of combinations of cell culture variables, identifying new protocols for efficient differentiation of stem cells.