There has been a virtual explosion over the last few years of a much more systematic acceptance of cell and gene therapy approaches to therapeutics - primarily in the cancer space with CAR T cell therapy. A key focus of cell therapy  and gene therapy modalities, in terms of therapeutics, is the assessment and monitoring of the immune system in that process. Quite simply the immune system serves as a point of efficacy and as a direct safety assessment point.  When you think about how flow cytometry contributes to therapeutic platforms, it's really about understanding the power of cellular and molecular analysis of individual cells at their surface and intracellularly.  Phenotypic and functional targets on immune effector cells or on specific cells that need to be corrected by that cell or gene therapy.

Flow Cytometry is a process of evaluating, with antibodies, fluorochrome-labeled antibodies, various targets on either the surface of a cell or within a cell. And that panoply of targets and points of monitoring can be looked at simultaneously in very large data sets using Flow. You can understand how a cell or gene therapy is interacting with a person, and whether it's safe or not. Then you can monitor the effects of that therapy over time, and ultimately even the efficacy of that therapy. So it's a perfect combination of features and benefits that make it the right platform for a therapeutic with initiatives that specifically target the immune system or defective cells within that immune system.

FlowMetric operates in GCLP, good clinical laboratory practice and GLP capability. Our services, looking at multicolor, or polychromatic flow cytometry panels, are an excellent way of being able to evaluate the effects of, for instance, CAR T-cellson the immune system, and the heart of cell therapy, really is an understanding of these T cells that have been engineered ex-vivo to express chimeric antigen receptors. So you can imagine how you would want to simultaneously look at cancer cells that are being targeted and flow cytometry can do that at the same time - looking at the effector cells or the cells that are actually driving that process.

You’re doing all these things simultaneously when conducting multiparameter flow. Our capabilities follow strict GLP and GCLP guidelines (good clinical laboratory practices) which enables us to provide the absolute best data sets possible that have been quality controlled. We create new paradigms to enable researchers to monitor their gene therapy or CAR T-cell therapy, on a regular basis by developing, optimizing and validating flow assays

Here in Philadelphia, a multitude of cell and gene therapy companies have taken up residence. Many of those companies are working with us on very novel and important platforms, monitoring the efficacy of their approaches to cell and gene therapy. This is probably the fastest growing arena for us in terms of a specific client base. We have a lot of success in the cell and gene therapy arena – with stories to match every bit of our experience.

If you couple FlowMetric’s experience with that of KCAS’s, our combined approach to the realm of cell and gene therapy, we are perfectly poised right now to offer these services in a way that very few can. KCAS brings a multicentric combined approach with a very strong molecular background. Combining this with Flowmetric’s cellular approach really gives our customers a very complete package in terms of what can be offered to their cell and gene therapy projects.

And we are both investing heavily in the future. Right now for an immuno-oncology new drug to come to market, it costs just over 2.2 billion. Our cost-effective approach to development ensures flow cytometry, is used to best advantage coupled with down stream molecular processing means customers get the most information from each precious sample. We have made investments to offer up to 48 parameter flow cytometry for analysis and cell sorting. This approach will bring added value for our customers in the cell and gene therapy space because we're able to answer more questions and analyze more data from precious samples that have few cells to assess.   This brings tremendous value to these projects that almost always have a very limited amount of sample to analyze.

We are absolutely at the top of the list when it comes to providing these types of services for our customers, and it shows because we're dealing with some of the most important companies in this space, who are working on some of the most transformative projects out there. We are bringing insight that is coming from a dedicated, growing team of expert scientists doing flow cytometry – and that this is all we do; day in and day out. Any organization in our space interested in top tier, quality controlled flow cytometry analysis of their gene or cell therapy product, is a company that would certainly benefit from service Flowmetric and KCAS are providing right now.

If you are in the biotech or big pharma space, with a cell gene therapy program, we welcome you to talk to our team and let us introduce you to the experience, deep knowledge, quality and state of the art platforms   we have to enable your cell or gene therapy product to be developed.