Proposed is the development the extended depth of field (EDF) or confocal like imaging capabilities of a breakthrough multispectral high resolution imaging flow cytometer. This platform shall have unparalleled cellular analysis capabilities intended to further biological space research (fundamental, micro-gravity and radiation biology) and the potential capability of monitoring astronaut health. The proposed platform shall simultaneously combine the high throughput analysis rates of flow cytometry, the high resolution imaging capabilities of multiple forms of high resolution microscopy (brightfield, darkfield and four fluorescent imaging channels) and the ability to image all cellular components in focus utilizing extended depth of field imaging. This cell observation platform shall find additional utility in NASAs biology space research given Amnis complimentary technologies, specifically: i) Amnis in-suspension labeling techniques for staining cellular structures and probing specific molecules in the nucleus, cytoplasm and membrane including fluorescent in situ hybridization. These in-suspension techniques eliminate the time consuming manual glass microscope slide preparation of cells which is problematic for micro gravity environment, ii) Amnis sample containment/injection pump operates similarly to NASAs rotating wall culture vessel allowing cells to be continually suspended via a rotational axis perpendicular to gravity.
Potential NASA Commercial Applications: (LIMIT 100 WORDS) The EDF multispectral high resolution imaging flow cytometer shall allow for semi-autonomous operation including (sample handling, object detection, image segmentation and cell classification). The instrument shall provide hundreds of times more cellular information than most sophisticated flow cytometers and microscopes. This instrument shall find immediate application to NASAs fundamental biology space program, specifically the analysis of cellular responses to microgravity and cosmic radiation. The instrument has application to apoptosis, phagocytosis, hematology, cytogenetic, and cell cycle analysis. Additionally, the instrument potentially could be used for in-flight research and clinical uses, specifically, for hematology and chromosomal aberration measurements for monitoring astronaut health.
Potential NON-NASA Commercial Applications:
: (LIMIT 100 WORDS) Beyond NASA fundamental space biology research and potential in-flight diagnostics, the proposed EDF Cell Analysis Platform has numerous potential non-NASA applications including: i) general purpose cell analysis research tool for cell counting, cell viability, studies involving apoptosis, chromosome enumeration and rearrangement, translocation, telomere length, morphometric and photometric analysis, ii) hematology instrumentation, iii) clinical diagnostics, iv) high content drug screening, v) early stage cancer screening, oncology for the detection of rare tumor cells of epithelial origin and vi) non-invasive prenatal diagnostics.
