Akadeum Life Sciences Previews First-of-its-kind Microbubble Cell Separation Instrument
Updated on Jan 2, 2024 Share
This revolutionary instrument marks an important step in bringing the performance advantages of our products into clinical manufacturing workflows.
ANN ARBOR, MI, Oct. 10, 2023 – Akadeum Life Sciences, the global leaders in buoyancy-based cell separation technology, have announced today the preview of their Alerion™cell separation system. The instrument will provide a closed system for separating T cells from a leukopak using Akadeum’s revolutionary Buoyancy Activated Cell Sorting (BACS™) microbubble technology. The instrument promises to speed up the cell separation process, increase cell recovery, automate several manual steps, improve sample processing robustness, decrease user error incidence, and reduce cell exhaustion.
Currently, revolutionary treatments like CAR T cell therapy can cost upwards of $500,000, partly because current technology is difficult to scale up in manufacturing processes. With few options in the market, customers are forced to settle for mediocre performance from dated technology. Akadeum’s microbubble technology addresses these challenges and offers a paradigm shift in the field of cell separation, activation, and expansion, promising higher performance, and lower prohibitive costs to improve accessibility. The new Alerion™ system brings even more robust cell separation workflows compared to legacy magnetic-activated cell separation (MACS®) and fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS) instruments. Akadeum’s new instrument enables unmatched scalability and productivity for T cell separation by processing more healthy cells per isolation and more isolations during a manufacturing shift.
Akadeum’s instrument utilizes a two-chamber consumable. In the bottom chamber, the leukopak material is mixed with an antibody cocktail and microbubble solution. Using cell-specific binding properties, the microbubbles adhere to a predetermined cell population. Next, the top chamber is opened, allowing cell separation to occur. The microbubbles are naturally buoyant so that T cells float to the top chamber, leaving the unwanted cells behind in the lower chamber. This automated process can be applied to Akadeum’s negative or positive selection kits and takes less than 60 minutes to complete.
Brandon McNaughton, Founder and CEO of Akadeum Life Sciences, one of the featured presenters at this year’s Meeting on the Mesa, October 10 – 12, in Carlsbad, California, will discuss the impact of the Akadeum platform on therapeutic development in the cell and gene therapy space. According to Akadeum’s CEO, “This revolutionary instrument marks an important step in bringing the performance advantages of our products into clinical manufacturing workflows. The instrument provides gentle separation, fast protocols, flexible workflows and does so in a closed system.”
Casey Wegner, Vice President of R&D at Akadeum, added: “For the first time, customers will have a choice of the cell separation technology they use. With the many features of our microbubbles, we believe many will now choose the Akadeum solution. Additionally, with the Alerion™ achieving cell recovery rates of 90% and above, will experience more healthy cells for use in cell and gene therapy, as compared to other technologies. Finally, microbubble technology is highly scalable and eco-friendly as opposed to the contamination associated with magnets. We’re thrilled with the work that our team has done to bring this instrument to researchers and developers.” For more information, visit https://www.akadeum.com/products.
About Akadeum Life Sciences, Inc.
Akadeum Life Sciences was formed to solve long-standing sample preparation problems in research, diagnostics, and cell therapy markets with a novel flotation-based target isolation platform technology. Without the critical step of separation (isolating biological targets like DNA, proteins, or cells from biological samples), many diagnostics and therapies are not possible. More than a solution to a single problem, this elegantly simple platform is disrupting the separation market—from nucleic acid extraction to cell isolation. Akadeum was the first to commercialize BACS™ (buoyancy activated cell sorting) microbubble kits for cell isolation applications. In parallel, Akadeum is actively establishing industry partnerships and collaborations. Akadeum’s kits are available in Research Use Only and as GMP-grade configurations. Inquire about Akadeum’s products, technology, or partnership opportunities at sales@akadeum.com.