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Automation of protein crystallography screening has contributed significantly to the rapid progress of crystallography based structural biology. Automation allows samples to be screened using smaller volumes of both protein and screen solutions, reducing costs and saving valuable protein. Additional benefits include increased throughput and accuracy. One of the challenges to automating this process is the necessity to accurately pipette solutions of varying viscosities

The Acumen eX3 is the fastest imaging system available, collecting and simultaneously analysing over 40 images/second, covering the entire well, without the trade off of having to use lower resolution. Acumen is well established for cell-based high-content screening, but researchers have recently applied its large field of view to rapidly analyse complex cellular or animal models, such as angiogenic tube formation, C. elegans or drosophila larvae.

Cell colony formation assays measure a cell's ability to grow unattached to a surface and have applications in a range of areas including hematopoietic stem cell research, cell transformation studies and the prediction of responses of tumors to chemotherapeutic agents. The results of this study demonstrated that Acumen eX3 can be used as a high-throughput platform for investigation of effects of test compounds and RNAi reagents on cell colony formation.

Membrane proteins, such as G-protein-coupled receptors, are known to be much more difficult to purify and crystallise than soluble proteins due to their native environment within the lipid bilayer of the cell membrane. The in meso (lipidic cubic phase or LCP) crystallisation technique has revolutionised the process of crystallising membrane proteins. This method utilises highly viscous lipid mesophases to contain the membrane proteins for crystallisation.

Peripheral blood is widely used as starting material for biomarker discovery and validation using molecular biology technologies. The vast majority of currently published transcriptome data is based on RNA derived either from stabilized whole blood or peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs). Here, gene expression profiling studies and SOPs for fast, easy and specific manual or automated isolation of monocytes directly from whole blood are being described.

Cyclic Voltammetry studies confirm the formation of a 1:1 host-guest inclusion complex between indole and ß-CD. Further it was also confirmed by IR, UV, XRD, SEM and Molecular Modeling studies. It was found that the N-H group containing five-membered ring with benzene ring may be present in the cavity of ß-CD.

Lexicon Pharmaceuticals have demonstrated that a practical automated verification system using HPLC, LC/MS, and 1D and 2D NMR can be implemented in an industrial/pharmaceutical environment. This system has proven to be robust, and provides added value to compound collection integrity and quality.

Quality by Design (QbD) has become popular within the pharmaceutical industry and the FDA has cited a risk-based approach to drug development as a desirable state for the near future.1 In this state, more complete information and transparency relating to risk assessment will be made available for new drug aplications speeding the approval process, and preventing late-stage failures.

Characterizing metabolite structures and metabolic pathways is essential to understanding the potential biological implications of compounds in drug discovery.

Characterizing metabolite structures and metabolic pathways is essential to understanding the potential biological implications of compounds in drug discovery.