A reliable, cost-effective & relevant assay providing predictive data on ion channel perturbation, arrhythmia and cardiotoxic effects without animal testing.
Due to the risk of discovering potentially fatal cardiotoxic side effects at the clinical stage, manufacturers and regulatory authorities require that more comprehensive testing is carried out on new drugs to identify potential problems early in development to both avoid danger to patients and save costs of developing products which will subsequently fail at a later stage.
DrugPrint® is a sophisticated and highly sensitive system for the rapid detection, identification and evaluation of ion channel perturbations and prediction of potential cardiotoxic side effects of new and existing drugs.DrugPrint® has been refined to enhance the identification of and discrimination between various drug-induced arrhythmias and characteristic classes of compounds.
The system uses microelectrode array (MEA) plates as a platform for culturing a human cardiac tissue model. These cells form a beating syncitium which simulate beating adult human heart tissue. The electrodes embedded in the MEA plate detect the electrical activity of the beating cells. Localised changes in the electrical activity of the various specific ion channels of beating cardiomyocytes comprising the cardiac model can be measured non-invasively as a series of field action potential ‘waveforms’.
The patented analytical algorithms of DrugPrint® compare the profile of experimental and control sfAP waveforms in a number of ways including measurements of specific individual components of the waveform profile. DrugPrint® identifies and characterises ion channel perturbations and cardiotoxic side effects, based on the assessment of a functional, human tissue construct, microelectrode array technology & sophisticated waveform analysis software. This includes drug induced arrhythmic activity across a broad adult human ion channel profile, not just hERG blockade.
DrugPrint® provides a comprehensive drug profile of QT, arrhythmia and specific ion channel perturbations, providing a multi factorial ‘data rich’ profile to assist in accurate decision-making in the drug development pathway.
The DrugPrint® analysis provides, quick, data-rich output in manual & automated reports which can be adapted for individual clients or regulators needs, significantly reducing data analysis times.
Fast & accurate assessments using MEA based assays early in drug development should significantly reduce the number of compounds that fail in later stages. This increases public safety & confidence in new drug treatments whilst also reducing drug development risks / costs & reliance on whole animal studies.