With increasing culture time and passage number, cell lines become prone to cellular senescence, apparent in genetic variations and permanent cell-cycle arrest. In addition to cell biological effects, your cultures are always at risk of microbial contamination as well as cross contamination. It is therefore necessary to establish backup stocks of quality cell lines, especially for the purpose of long term cultivation. Cryopreservation is a vital method to preserve cell lines in order to have access to fresh cell stocks when required.

Culture conditions are cell type dependent and should be tailored to the specific cell type you are working with. Anchorage dependent cells are cultivated as monolayer on tissue culture treated surfaces or specific matrices, while suspension cells are cultured suspended in vessels or bioreactors filled with media. All cells are sensitive to changes in temperature, pH of culture medium, oxygen and carbon dioxide levels. Cultivation conditions should be closely monitored.

“The journey is the reward”- careful quality testing during cryopreservation and culture routine ensures that final experiments are performed with viable, proliferating cells. Thus the analysis of behavior, metabolism or functionality of your cells in specific cell based assays safeguards reliable and reproducible results among experimental replicates.