Screening
most robust and scalable platforms so screening facilities are more productive. The CellInsight NXT provides throughput, assay breadth and the robustness necessary to bring High Content more into primary screening facilities. These tools are all connected by BioInformatics tools that enable users to make decisions about their compounds more rapidly and in the context of other assay data.”
As previously noted, a major barrier to the adoption of HCS technologies has been the man- agement of data and that data management, which has been a major constraint in screening operations. “Historically, analysis and manage- ment of HCS images and the resulting data has been the domain of software packages attached to the high content imagers,” said Dr Stephan Heyse, Head of Genedata Screener® Business Unit. “However, such data analysis software bun- dled with HCS instruments was not designed for higher throughput – it did not keep pace with instrumentation output from automated assays. Additionally, it was not designed to integrate with, for example, other HCS instruments, other image analysis packages, or with corporate screening analysis workflows and data manage- ment systems. This created an HCS analysis and data management bottleneck. To address these issues, Genedata Screener® was designed. In 2012, we added support for direct analysis of cell population data as part of the screening data analysis, which enables scientists to interactively define and analyse cell populations for complete screening experiments, which I believe to be an industry first.”
Molecular Devices has also introduced new tools for data management. “On the software front, Molecular Devices launched MetaXpress® Software 5.0 in summer 2012,” said Dr Chandy. “This latest release empowers users to create com- plex analysis using the Custom Module Editor. The new interface guides users through a step-by-step creation of custom analysis, such as identifying objects within objects, creating morphometric clas- sifiers for shape analysis and analysing transmitted light images. Users can specify which responses to detect and which measurements to report out, sav- ing unnecessary analysis time.”
Other improvements being made in data han- dling comes from De Novo Software which has released FCS Express™ Flow and Image Cytometry software package with the option for a High Content Analysis add-on. “The HCS add-on allows high content customers to quickly analyse and make sense of their flow and image cytometry
Drug Discovery World Spring 2013
Figure 3: Adoption of HCS © HighTech Business Decisions
Figure 4: Application of HCS © HighTech Business Decisions
data while easily allowing the creation of high quality exports to PowerPoint, Excel and other lab information systems,” said Sean Burke, Product Manager at De Novo Software. “With FCS Express Plus, customers have the added benefit of combining HCS Flow and Image Cytometry analy- sis in one seamless package.” De Novo Software has also been working with industry leaders such as PerkinElmer, Molecular Devices and Thermo Fisher to provide direct compatibility of imaging data generated by their high content screening devices with FCS Express.
Suppliers are also making improvements in con- sumables and reagents. For example, Corning has developed microplates that improve HCS imaging and throughput. “At Corning, we continuously
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