NanoSight's new generation nanoparticle
characterisation system - The NanoSight NS500

The NS500 incorporates new hardware and software to deliver NanoSight's growing capability in particle-by-particle characterisation in an automated package. The first system is in use at the University of Oxford in the Nuffield Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology of the John Radcliffe Hospital as part of a program supported by the Wellcome Foundation.

The fluid handling capability of NS500 provides the user with auto sample presentation and in-situ cleaning.

NanoSight's technology, known as Nanoparticle Tracking Analysis (NTA), provides a high-resolution particle size distribution, and not by DLS (dynamic light scattering). NTA detects individual particles as small as 20nm and, in real time, simultaneously tracks and sizes whole populations. The result is a particle size distribution that provides researchers with an over view of their samples showing everything in the whole range 20 - 1,000nm. NTA also provides count and concentration, together with a unique view which validates these results.

The NS500 adds fluorescence capability, enabling the user to tune into individual particles, with sensitivity to detect individual quantum dots whilst eliminating background interference of other particles and media. Standard beads may be used to bind to single particles for optimum study.

The fluid handling capability of NS500 provides the user with auto sample presentation and in-situ cleaning. It is now a routine process to clean the cell with the ability to purge, flush and load samples through user-customisable software. Dilution may also be optimised then controlled in this way. Ease of use is further enhanced with a motorised focus function to readily home in on the particles under study. In direct response to user feedback this is augmented with an indexed motorised stage, controlled through the software and providing excellent repeatability in positioning. The temperature control of the cell offers a broad range (15˚C to 55˚C) and programmable temperature cycling, with rapid attainment of set-point facilitating faster sample measurement and turnaround.

The goal of the NS500 is to provide an easy-to-use, reproducible platform applicable for specific and general nanoparticle characterisation use. So whether the application is to control size in nanoparticle development, provide rapid virus titer or measure the kinetics of protein aggregation, the NS500 system is the solution.

For further information, view website: www.nanosight.com and register for the latest issue of NanoTrail, the company's electronic newsletter.  Refer to next page

LAB2LAB sample management success

TTP LabTech has recently highlighted the success of its LAB2LAB®, pneumatic microtube management and delivery system, with leading articles published in the respected industry journals, Genetic Engineering News (GEN) and Drug Discovery News (DDN). The articles focus on the workflow benefits to the customer provided by the LAB2LAB® platform. The ability of LAB2LAB® to connect researchers in remote laboratories, throughout research facilities, improves scheduling and accessibility of sensitive analytical instruments and boosts workflow for entire teams.   

These articles discuss the importance of providing laboratory chemists with greater access to the analytical power of instruments such as LC/MS and GC/MS.  Authored in collaboration with Dr. Brian Everatt, Investigator III, Novartis, LAB2LAB's® success will be supported by a presentation, given by Brian at 5pm on 30 June at the upcoming European Lab Automation conference, Hamburg Germany.

1) Drug Discovery Tutorial published in GEN (Vol. 31, No. 12, June 2011), entitled "Lab Transport and Management System: LAB2LAB® Designed to Connect Remote Labs to a Central Instrument Facility"
http://www.genengnews.com/gen-articles/lab-transport-and-management-system/3697/

2) Case study published in DDN (Vol. 7, No. 6 June 2011), entitled "Increasing Access for Medicinal Chemists with LAB2LAB®"
http://www.drugdiscoverynews.com/index.php?newsarticle=4971

Characterising the chemical nature of intermediate products from complex synthetic reactions is essential, with delays in analysis causing sample degradation or preventing the efficient production of a compound. A study of the time taken between submission of samples for analysis and delivery of results back to the scientist, indicated that LAB2LAB® significantly boosted workflow and reduced analysis time within a central core facility, prioritising urgent samples for analysis and holding non-urgent samples within a temporary buffer until an instrument becomes free.

To read more about the success of LAB2LAB® and its applications, view website: http://www.ttplabtech.com/products/lab2lab/index.html

TTP LabTech Ltd in profile
Based near Cambridge, UK, TTP LabTech supplies laboratory instrumentation for the healthcare, biotech and pharmaceutical sectors. TTP LabTech's products are designed to increase efficiency, effectiveness, flexibility or overall capability in key biopharmaceutical research processes including compound storage (comPOUND®), low volume liquid handling (mosquito®), high content screening (Acumen®), antibody discovery (Mirrorball®) and sample analysis management (LAB2LAB).

For further information view website: www.ttplabtech.com  Refer to page 292 

Landmark publication reports potential of exosomes as biomarkers
for early disease detection using NanoSight's NTA technology

NanoSight, leading manufacturers of unique nanoparticle characterization technology, reports the new publication in one of the most cited peer reviewed journals in nanoscience and nanotechnology, NanoMedicine. It has been written by a group of researchers from the Nuffield Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, Oxford University.

The rapidly growing field of exosomes and microvesicles is highlighted in a new paper in NanoMedicine (http://www.nanomedjournal.com/article/S1549-9634(11)00163-8/abstract). Titled "Sizing and phenotyping of cellular vesicles using Nanoparticle Tracking Analysis," it has been authored by a team led by Professors Ian Sargent and Paul Harrison.

Picture: Professor Ian Sargent from the Nuffield Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology, Oxford University.

Cellular microvesicles and exosomes (nanovesicles) are involved in many disease processes and have been shown to have major potential for use as biomarkers. However, developments in this area have been constrained by limitations in the technology available for their measurement. This ground-breaking paper reports on the use of fluorescence nanoparticle tracking analysis (NTA) to rapidly size and phenotype cellular vesicles. In the NTA system, manufactured by NanoSight (Amesbury, UK), vesicles are visualized by light scattering using a light microscope. A video is recorded and then the NTA software tracks the Brownian motion of the individual vesicles calculating their size and total concentration. Using human placental vesicles and plasma, the team has demonstrated that NTA can measure cellular vesicles as small as ∼50 nm which is far more sensitive than conventional flow cytometry (lower limit ∼300 nm). By combining NTA with fluorescence measurement, it has been shown that vesicles can be labeled with specific antibody-conjugated quantum dots, allowing their phenotype to be determined.

Comprehensive funding for the work was provided by a Wellcome Trust Technology Development, a Wellcome Trust Programme Grant and by the Oxford Partnership Comprehensive Biomedical Research Centre with support from the Department of Health's NIHR Biomedical Research Centres funding scheme. For further information, view website: www.nanosight.com and register for the latest issue of NanoTrail, the company's electronic newsletter.  Refer to next page

Johns Hopkins University uses NanoSight
to study self-assembled polymer/DNA particles

The Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine is using the NanoSight LM10-HS system to study self-assembled polymer/DNA particles for drug delivery.

The main research interests of Dr Jordan Green of the Biomaterials and Drug Delivery Laboratory are in cellular engineering and nanobiotechnology. Knowledge of particle size is of particular value in the characterization of different drug delivery systems. Having had previous experience using dynamic light scattering techniques, Dr Green and his team now also use the complementary technique of nanoparticle tracking analysis from NanoSight. NTA provides insight into their samples particularly those with polydisperse behavior.

The laboratory chose the NanoSight LM10-HS system equipped with an EMCCD high sensitivity camera and a 404 nm laser for particle sizing analysis. In a typical study, particle solutions were diluted in DI water to adjust the sample concentration to a level such that there were approximately 30-60 light scattering centers in the visual analysis window. A sixty second movie containing the Brownian motion tracking of each individual particle was recorded. The movie was processed to enable detection of a least 250 particle tracks per sample. The NTA analysis gives a direct number-averaged distribution of the particle size as well as absolute particle concentration. The mean, standard deviation and mode of the particles is then calculated.

In this method, each individual particle is independently sized so that a direct number-averaged mean can be calculated. As each particle is counted, a mode, or the peak in the number distribution, can also be calculated. For monodisperse particle populations, both DLS and NTA measured the same values for particle size. However, NTA allowed finer distinction between peaks in samples that were polydisperse. The uniformity of polymeric nanoparticle distribution is thought to be a property of the polymer structure, and in particular, of the polymer terminal group. Changes to polymer terminal group were also found to dramatically change gene delivery efficacy of these nanoparticles in 2-D and 3-D cell systems.

For further information, view website: www.nanosight.com and register for the latest issue of NanoTrail, the company's electronic newsletter.  Refer to next page