Microbiology

IN VITRO PRE-CLINICAL TESTING OPERATIONS

Receive specific cultures from authentic validated sources. KamTek is registered with BEI-NIAID program at ATCC to receive a wide variety of fully characterized microbial cultures as glycerol stocks for research purposes. In addition, KamTek establishes collaborative arrangements with academic labs that specialize in isolating and characterizing specific microbes. Alternatively, clients provide their own microbes for any of the following operations. From these sources cultures could arrive as cryo-preserved stocks or live cultures. KamTek is however, not set up for "Select Agents" and does not receive those agents.

 

Revive, expand, and cryopreserve microbial cultures as glycerol stocks or spore stocks for long term cryo-storage and subsequent experimental use.

 

KamTek staff  is fully trained and lab is fully equipped to handle both anaerobic and aerobic biosafety class II microbes. Regularly performed operations include:

  • Reviving cultures on agar plates with agar media suitable for specific microbes. 
  • Small scale growth in defined culture broth media to use for experimental purposes.
  • Expand cultures and cryo-preserve for long term storage.
  • Set up cultures of sporulating microbes to induce and study sporulation.
  • Expand specific cultures of sporulating microbes to prepare spore stocks for long term storage and subsequent use for in vitro as well as in vivo studies.
  • Set up experiments to study spore germination process under certain conditions or to perform experiments with vegetative state of specific microbes under specific conditions.

 


Study anti-microbial activity of investigational compounds. KamTek staff performs in vitro determinations of minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC) of investigational compounds on regular basis.  These determinations are made both on target bacteria and other bacteria to establish their real clinical utility.  Depending on the requirements, the following operations are also carried out:

  • Drug solubility,
  • Drug formulation studies for their in-vitro potency and stability
  • Drug stability testing for its anti-microbial potency
  • Drug-drug interaction,
  • Post-antibiotic treatment effect,
  • Rate of killing, and
  • Frequency of development of resistance. 
  • Cytotoxicity studies of anti-microbials and toxins on mammalian cell cultures
  • Diagnostics tests that require molecular biology lab operations such as immunoassays and PCR based nucleic acid diagnostics.

The lab is equipped with a Bactron EZ (Shell Labs) anaerobic chamber for handling anaerobic bacteria, with a BSL-2 Class II laminar flow hood for handling aerobic bacteria, an autoclave reagent and labware sterilizations as well as inactivating live microbes before discarding.

 

IN VIVO PRE-CLINICAL TESTING SERVICES

KamTek has an arranged partnership with a local animal facility with decades of experience in preclinical studies using a variety of animals for:
  • Development of drug formulations for testing efficacy in animal models;
  • Design and management of preclinical efficacy studies in suitable animal models: pharmacodynamic studies;
  • Testing of drug levels and their metabolites in body fluids and tissues: pharmacokinetic studies; and
  • Microbiome studies: Effect of antimicrobial(s) or other agents on gut microbiome and microbiome at other sites of the body.