Co-culture cassette for anaerobes and primary human intestinal epithelium

The human colon is a remarkable organplaying critical roles in drug uptake and metabolism as well as harboring thetrillion microbial cells of the microbiomewhich itself has multiple impacts on human healthFor these reasonsthere is a widespread need in academia and the biotechnology marketplace for in vitro studies of human colon physiology and the interaction between colon tissue and the anaerobic bacteria of the microbiomeTo meet this needAltis Biosystems LLCan early stage biotechnology companywill collaborate with scientists at the University of North CarolinaUNCat Chapel Hill to develop a new technology for cell culture to co culture normalhuman colonic epithelial cells with anaerobic microbiotaThe platform will be designed with the eventual goal during Phase II of creating systems for unique highcontent assays of cellular activity at the interface of the human colonic epithelium and microbiomeIn this Phase I SBIRthis collaboration will designprototype and test the Selfsustaining Intestinal Microbiome PlatformSIMPleThe goal is to expand the use of this technology to the large community in the life science marketThe collaboration represents an ideal opportunity for the translation of an academic technology to the marketplace through the NIH sponsored SBIR programWe will prototype user friendly SIMPle cassettes capable of maintaining a steep oxygen gradient between luminal and basal reservoirs and establish protocols long term co culture of aerobic epithelial cells with anaerobic microbiota The novel SIMPle platform will have broad applications in various health and scientific related areas of gastrointestinal research and in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industriesThe technology will create a livingfunctional model of the human colonenabling unique studies of the colon and its interplay with the microbiomepreand probiotics and drugs