Culture Collections news
Read about our new products, collaborations, upcoming events and find out about latest scientific developments and announcements. We welcome your feedback and comments - please email culturecollections@phe.gov.uk
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Cell Culture and QRT PCR Gene Expression
Integrating Cell Culture and Gene Expression Analysis by QRT PCR
March 2021
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NCPV viruses are used within research both as the subject of investigation and also as positive controls. This article highlights several papers published in 2020 which include the use of NCPV strains.
February 2021
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Last year was a hugely significant and memorable year for the National Collection of Type Cultures. On 1st January the collection entered its centenary year, a year which has proven to be more eventful and challenging than was originally expected.
January 2021
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We started 2020 with a shutdown of our ultra-low temperature storage (ULTS) facility, resulting in a suspension of all order dispatch. The coronavirus pandemic had begun to sweep the world and by April, we had to suspend all non-essential and non-COVID related activities.
January 2021
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Understanding the biology and limitations of 293, a widely used and genetically unstable cell line, is key to its successful cell culture. The cells have a unique actin cytoskelton compared to other cell lines, and they are loosely adherent so will detach if cultures are exposed to temperatures below 30°C.
January 2021
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“Enteric cytopathogenic human orphan viruses” (echoviruses) are a group of related enteroviruses (family: Picornaviridae; genus Enterovirus B) commonly found in the human gastro-intestinal tract.
January 2021
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iPSCs: a tool to investigate SARS-CoV-2
iPSC-derivatives are key for physiologically relevant cell models.
January 2021
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A brief review.
January 2021
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Bringing together the UK’s expert centres in biological resource curation.
December 2020
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Bacteriophage Collection from NCTC – eBook
Bacteriophages have been attracting increasing levels of attention from both scientists and the mainstream media in recent years. The NCTC bacteriophage collection contains over 100 Staphylococcus, Streptococcus and Campylobacter bacteriophages. Download our online resources created in collaboration with ID Hub to find out more.
December 2020
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Five NCTC strains used in proficiency testing with aberrant characteristics
The Food and Environmental Proficiency Testing Unit is responsible for external quality assessment schemes where known but undisclosed samples are introduced into a lab’s routine testing procedure. This has many benefits including improving the standard of examinations, demonstrating to a commitment to quality and identifying any problems.
November 2020
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Seasonal human coronaviruses – the forgotten relatives of famous viruses?
In the last 20 years, three novel coronaviruses have emerged resulting in significant morbidity and mortality. While our recent experiences with SARS-CoV, MERS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 paint the picture of coronaviruses as an extreme threat to human health, the four other coronaviruses known to infect humans typically result in the ‘the common cold’.
November 2020
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UK NEQAS for Microbiology: Molecular detection of SARS-CoV-2 EQA
The unprecedented pandemic caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) causing Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is posing challenges for SARS-CoV-2 testing laboratories in the UK and worldwide.
November 2020
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Several articles related to EBiSC2 have been published on topics such as the generation of isogenic, gene-edited iPSC lines in Alzheimer's disease research, the Human Pluripotent Stem Cell Registry (hPSCreg) and its role in registration of pluripotent cell lines and EBiSC as a cell line bank for disease studies.
October 2020
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New UK SMI syndromic documents to be published soon
UK Standards for Microbiology Investigations (UK SMIs) are a comprehensive referenced collection of recommended algorithms and procedures for clinical microbiology. S7 – Gastroenteritis is the first of a new series of UK SMIs to be published under the new syndromic framework.
October 2020
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NCTC zoonotic pathogens: Salmonella bongori
Salmonella bongori is one of two species in the genus Salmonella; five additional strains of which have recently been made available from NCTC.
October 2020
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NCTC zoonotic pathogens: Shiga-toxic Escherichia coli reference strains
Escherichia coli is a common commensal organism found in the intestine of warm-blooded organisms. Some variants of Escherichia coli can cause severe disease, some of which are divided into pathotypes based on their gene content, interaction with host cells and associated pathologies.
October 2020
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Supporting veterinary microbiology: From chickens to chinchillas
NCTC is the worlds oldest bacterial strain collection and it is widely known that it provides authenticated clinical strains to support medical microbiologists and scientists. However, one of NCTCs lesser known functions is that it also houses alongside its medically relevant strains a number of strains of veterinary significance which have been sourced from animals over the last one hundred years.
October 2020
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A new digital exhibition of the archive material from the foundation of the UK’s Microbiology Society and the work of its first president, Sir Alexander Fleming, features items from the NCTC archives.
October 2020
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A new cohort of Huntington’s disease iPSC lines available from EBiSC
The true potential of iPSC research lies in the ability to generate specific cell types from a known genetic background. By application to the EBiSC Data Access Committee, researchers can access genomic datasets associated with EBiSC iPSCs to accelerate their research.
September 2020
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EBiSC banking and distribution centres have been busy over the last few months supporting local COVID response efforts and protecting our vital teams by restricting on site access required for cell line distribution. However we are very happy to say that EBiSC is now back open for business.
September 2020
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Heart disease specific iPSC lines for in vitro disease modelling and drug testing
IPSC derived cardiomyocytes offer great promise for generating new mechanistic insight into diseases and enabling assessment of drug efficacy and safety for individual patients than currently used preclinical models.
September 2020
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Accelerate iPSC research and access whole genome sequencing data via EBiSC
The true potential of iPSC research lies in the ability to generate specific cell types from a known genetic background. By application to the EBiSC Data Access Committee, researchers can access genomic datasets associated with EBiSC iPSCs to accelerate their research.
September 2020
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From obscurity to notoriety - the evolving nature of viral diseases
Which virus will be next to make the jump from relative obscurity to front page news is now a vital question for scientists to answer.
July 2020
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New Antimicrobial Resistance Reference Strains brochure now available
A revised edition of the National Collection of Type Cultures' Antimicrobial Resistant Reference strains brochure is now available online.
July 2020
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EBISC iPSCs: establishment and implementation of a quality control regime
In a new report recently published, O’Shea et al outline the establishment and implementation of a quality control regime suitable for a large-scale operational setting.
July 2020
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Using cell lines for arbovirus research
At Culture Collections, we are able to aid viral research through providing many popular mammalian and mosquito cell lines suitable for the successful culturing of arboviruses.
July 2020
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Unique cell lines: GP2d and GP5d
ECACC has a number of unique human cell lines not available from any other culture collection. Starting with human colon carcinoma lines GP2d and GP5d we will be featuring these unique cell lines in a series of articles.
July 2020
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Investigating the role of cryptic prophages within their bacterial hosts: NCTC new accessions
Genetically-modified strains of K-12 E. coli (NCTC 14365 -14374) derived from the wild-type strain NCTC 14364 have been added to NCTC's collection.
July 2020
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Coming soon to the ECACC General Collection are 47 new cells lines from human Ovary, Breast and Fallopian Tube tissue samples. These cell lines offer paired cell lines from a ‘normal’ and ‘engineered’ diseased state.
July 2020
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Herpes Simplex Virus 1, also known as Human herpesvirus 1 (HHV-1) is one of eight herpesviruses that typically infect humans. HSV-1 is responsible for oral herpes which is endemic globally with over 3 billion people under age 50 living with the infection.
April 2020
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Viruses 2020 Conference – Novel Concepts in Virology
The third meeting of ‘Viruses’ an international virology conference entitled ‘Novel Concepts in Virology’ took place on the 5-7 of February 2020, at Axa Convention Centre, Barcelona, Spain.
April 2020
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Mollicutes are characterised by their absence of a cell wall and the appearance of fried-egg shaped colonies when grown on agar. They have evolved by a process of selective reduction from gram positive bacteria and they are the smallest free-living prokaryotes.
April 2020
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17 novel strains isolated from animals have been deposited into the NCTC collection by the US Food and Drug Administration Research Laboratory. The strains include novel species of the genus Mycoplasma, Acholeplasma and Ureaplasma.
April 2020
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'AuthentiCell' brand coming soon...
'AuthentiCell' is a new family of services from the European Collection of Authenticated Cell Cultures (ECACC), encompassing Short Tandem Repeat (STR) profiling and a new public STR Profile database.
April 2020
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iPSC revolution in neurodiseases modelling
iPSC-based models offer researchers the possibility to develop a more in-depth understanding of the pathological mechanisms involved in human diseases, especially neurological diseases.
April 2020
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COVID-19 response: 7 April 2020
Culture Collections continues to support Public Health England (PHE) in the delivery of essential services central to the COVID-19 response. Dispatch of orders and provision of all services remains suspended at this time; however, we are working hard to direct customers to products where possible.
April 2020
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NCTC Centenary features in Microbiologist magazine
The Society for Applied Microbiology, SfAM, has featured an article about NCTC's 100 year anniversary event and history in providing authentic bacteria for use in scientific studies.
Jan 2020
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NCTC has been in operation for 100 years, surviving a world war, six relocations and acute financial hardship. Nevertheless, the collection is thriving and making a significant contribution to our understanding of 21st century infectious diseases and how to overcome them.
Jan 2020
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California Serogroup Viruses are a collection of genetically related but serologically distinct arboviruses. NCPV currently offers several California Serogroup Viruses including TAHV, INKV, and LACV, with accessions for CEV, JCV and SSHV anticipated to become available mid-2020.
Jan 2020
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Human Respiratory Syncytial virus (HRSV) is one of many viruses responsible for mild cold-like symptoms in humans. NCPV assists the scientific community in the study of these viruses and has 13 RSV virus strains currently available in the collection.
Jan 2020
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Multidrug resistant Staphylococcus epidermidis lineages added to the NCTC
Staphylococcus epidermidis is both present on healthy human skin and the cause of significant number of infections worldwide. In 2018 J. Y. H. Lee et al. described three multidrug resistant lineages of S. epidermidis, which are now available via the NCTC.
Jan 2020
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Deposit your microbial strains with Culture Collections
You can freely deposit organisms with us, which are then maintained by experienced staff, supported by experts in Public Health England’s specialist and reference laboratories, who use a combination of traditional and more novel procedures to ensure the integrity of the strains.
Jan 2020
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Anglo-Antipodean Partnership and product release of SIRMu-1
One of ECACC's newest acquisitions, SIRMu-1, was kindly shared by our colleagues at Cell Bank Australia, who have been in partnership with ECACC since 2008.
Jan 2020
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Latest News from NCTC artist in residence Anna Dumitriu
Anna Dumitriu is continuing her collaboration as Artist in Residence with the NCTC and currently developing a series new works based on historically important bacteria in the collection.
Jan 2020
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A new cohort of iPSC lines available from EBiSC will accelerate research into Huntington’s disease
EBiSC & CHDI Foundation have collaborated with Censo Biotechnologies to generate a cohort of 45 iPSC lines derived from Huntington’s disease (HD) gene-expansion carriers (HDGECs)/associated controls.
Jan 2020
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Discover our updated brochures and leaflets
A selection of our brochures and leaflets have recently been updated for 2020; showing our latest products and services and providing the most up-to-date information on what we can offer you and your research.
Jan 2020
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NCTC Centenary 2020: 100 years of collaborating with the bacteriology community
In 2020, NCTC celebrates 100 years of collaborating with bacteriologists from around the globe. To start the celebrations NCTC will be holding a one-day symposium on 2 March. Register Now
Jan 2020
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The ECACC Fundamentals of Cell Culture course: hear from the delegates
Following last October’s course, we spoke to two delegates about their experiences on the course, what they learnt, and how they can apply their acquired knowledge to future research.
Jan 2020
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UK Biobank award for MND Association
Congratulations to the MND Association for being awarded the prestigious accolade of 2019 UK Biobank of the Year Award last week. The award recognises their work on the UK MND Collections.
Dec 2019
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OVPA8 cell line is derived from ascitic fluid from a 47-year-old platinum-treated patient with relapsed ovarian cancer (histologically confirmed high-grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSOC); adenocarcinoma papillare serosum, G3, FIGO IIIC).
Nov 2019
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Here you can find links to selected webinars, featuring advice and useful information on best practice and trends in cell culture. Other topics covered include choosing the right cell line for your research and global answers from authentication services.
Nov 2019
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Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) are increasingly being used in research. The number of publications citing the use of iPSCs is increasing every year. To assist scientists in their research ECACC provide quality-controlled and disease-relevant iPSC lines.
Oct 2019
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Cell lines aiding virology research
Some of the most significant catastrophes in human history have been caused by infectious diseases. The 1918 influenza pandemic, is thought to be accountable for over 50 million deaths, and is arguably one of the most devastating outbreaks of the early 20th century.
Oct 2019
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Social Media Manager vacancy with The European Culture Collection Organization (ECCO)
The European Culture Collection Organization (ECCO) is looking for a Social Media Manager to join their communication team! The ECCO Social Media Manager will post on behalf of ECCO by working closely with the ECCO board.
Oct 2019
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Looking backwards to move forward
Many pathogens that caused devastating disease throughout human history remain problematic today. This mini review brings together studies which have utilized ancient DNA, individual historical isolates (both extant and dead) and collections of historical isolates.
Oct 2019
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NCTC scientists inspiring the future
NCTC takes an active role in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) public outreach. Our NCTC Quality Control Supervisor, Hannah McGregor, explains why she became a STEM-Ambassador and discusses the wide range of events NCTC has recently been involved in.
Oct 2019
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NCPV is primarily comprised of human pathogenic viruses that require handling at biosafety levels 2, 3 and 4. In 2018, many research articles were published using NCPV viruses including 5 which will be reviewed in this article.
Oct 2019
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NCPV is primarily comprised of human pathogenic viruses that require handling at biosafety levels 2, 3 and 4. In 2018, many research articles were published using NCPV viruses including 5 which will be reviewed in this article.
Oct 2019
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The importance of immortalising the bacteriophage
In recent years, phages have been attracting increasing attention from both scientists and the mainstream media due to their potential role in the treatment of bacterial infections (phage therapy). NCTC has recently established a bacteriophage repository, which aims to provide a trustworthy source of authenticated phages.
Sep 2019
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Inkoo virus added to NCPV's collection
Inkoo virus is one of ten mosquito-borne viruses known to be pathogenic to humans within Europe. The virus belongs to the family Peribunyaviridae, genus Orthobunyavirus. Research suggests it is mainly asymptomatic but can cause diseases. Inkoo virus has recently been added to our catalogue as 1308255v.
July 2019
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Preparing for a project involving cell culture for the new term
Top tips for all project leaders, supervisors and postgraduate students embarking on a new project involving cell culture in the new term.
July 2019
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The development and production of vaccines requires large quantities of viruses or bacteria. Bacteria are easily cultured, providing they have a suitable growth medium and conditions. However, viruses infect living cells in order to replicate; resulting in difficulties for laboratories.
July 2019
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Rare Salmonella serotype deposited into the NCTC
Earlier this year, scientists from Public Health England’s Gastrointestinal Bacteria Reference Unit and collaborators described the first known outbreak of Salmonella Adjame which occurred in 2017 in London, UK. The strains are now deposited in our collection as NCTC 14246, NCTC 14247 and NCTC 14248.
July 2019
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20 years serving the virology community
The National Collection of Pathogenic Viruses was established in 1999, with funding from the Wellcome Trust, for the benefit of developing and testing of vaccines and antiviral compounds. Our remit is to identify, preserve and provide relevant pathogenic viruses for the scientific community.
July 2019
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Exploring the pathology of less prominent species
There are approximately 200 validly described species in the genus Clostridium. Among them are multiple human and animal pathogens. Naturally, the genus also contains species whose pathogenic potential and clinical significance remains understudied.
July 2019
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U-2 OS is one of the earliest described cancer derived cell lines obtained from a moderately differentiated bone. Recently, the cell line has shown itself to be useful as a successful transfection host. This combined with absence of any detectable adenovirus infection makes the cell line a useful expression platform in virology.
July 2019
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The European Bank for induced pluripotent Stem Cells (EBiSC) is carrying out a survey to better understand users’ iPSC needs. If you use or intend to use iPSCs, help us understand your needs by completing the survey.
July 2019
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Importance of UK NEQAS External Quality Assurance (EQA)
UK NEQAS is an independent non-profit organisation with nearly 50 years’ experience in the provision of EQA to clinical laboratories. EQA is an educational tool that enables participants to examine, monitor and improve their own laboratory performance.
May 2019
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The first globally reported Neisseria gonorrhoeae strain to exhibit high-level ceftriaxone and azithromycin resistance has recently been made available in our collection as NCTC 14208.
May 2019
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NCTC and the science of small silverware
Microorganisms are used to to understand the properties of microscopic particles. It is clear that scientists are using bacterial pathogens from the National Collection of Type Cultures (NCTC) to test nanoparticle applications in fighting infectious diseases. This was demonstrated after NCTC curators reviewed up to 100 studies published in 2018.
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May 2019
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CO2 Concentration and pH Control in the Cell Culture Laboratory
Most cell culture laboratories will have a humidified Carbon Dioxide (CO2) incubator set to 5%, however it is not always obvious why our cultures need this amount of CO2, nor what the acceptable tolerances are for the ranges in concentration.
April 2019
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The European Bank for induced pluripotent Stem Cells launches a second project phase to become a self-sustainable repository for human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSC), extend the existing cell catalogue, and offer additional hiPSC-related services.
April 2019
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ECACC: A Dynamic Culture Collection for Disease Research
Twenty new cell lines are now available to researchers which include numerous cancer cell lines relating to colorectal, breast and gastric cancers, treatment resistant cancer cell lines, immortalised mouse embryonic fibroblast cell lines and hybridomas.
February 2019
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How culture collections can assist responses to emerging disease
Diagnosis of viral infections is often achieved by testing clinical samples using molecular methods such as PCR and sequencing, or serology.
January 2019
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In 2018, eight new viral strains from five families were made available through the NCPV online catalogue.
January 2019
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NCTC bacteriophage collection and repository
The UK Standards for Microbiology Investigations (UK SMI) have issued a new virology document, V53: Screening and monitoring for hepatitis E infection.
January 2019
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UK SMI: New HEV screening document
The UK Standards for Microbiology Investigations (UK SMI) have issued a new virology document, V53: Screening and monitoring for hepatitis E infection.
January 2019
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Dr. R. Ian Freshney (1938-2019): A tribute
Dr. R Ian Freshney passed away on 6 January 2019. He was a distinguished scientist and will be much missed by the cell culture community.
January 2019
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Streptococcus pneumoniae: New deep sequenced reference genome available A new detailed reference genome accompanied with its own novel genome browser (produced using a combination of state-of-the-art sequencing and bioinformatics technologies) for the NCTC 7466 descendent strain NCTC 14078 / D39V Streptococcus pneumoniae has recently been published in Nucleic Acids Research.
November 2018
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NCTC's partners in Beijing It’s always exciting for NCTC microbiologists to visit other Culture Collections and a recent opportunity to drop in on the China Center of Industrial Culture Collection (CICC)was no exception.
November 2018
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NCTC: the national collection supporting global health NCTC are proud to support the partnership between the PHE International Health Regulation (IHR) Strengthening project and Nigeria’s Centre for Disease Control (NCDC).
November 2018
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The Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) service at Public Health England have sequenced over 100,000 microbial genomes. NCTC E.coli K12 DNA is the control organism of choice.
November 2018
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Herpes simplex virus type 1 panel A team at the National Reference Laboratory at Public Health England isolated a series of HSV-1 viruses from immunocompromised patients undergoing antiviral therapy, and phenotyped them for antiviral susceptibility.
November 2018
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Advances in molecular pathology: Cell line authentication Advances in Molecular Pathology, a new Elsevier journal, was launched earlier this month. This first issues contains four articles on cell line missidentification.
November 2018
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Dr. Muriel Robertson FRS (1883-1973) for the new £50 design The National Collection of Type Cultures has nominated Dr. Muriel Robertson to feature on the Bank of England’s £50 note
November 2018
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PHE-MOHS Ebola Biobank The PHE-MOHS Ebola Biobank holds approximately 9955 residual clinical samples collected during the West Africa Ebola outbreak. The biobank is an open resource and is available to bona fide scientists undertaking health related research to inform public health strategy relating to Ebola.
September 2018
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NCTC welcomes Anna Dumitriu as artist in residence Pioneering BioArtist Anna Dumitriu has joined NCTC as artist in residence and will be exploring the extensive collection to develop artworks inspired by and incorporating NCTC's historic microbes.
August 2018
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NCTC in the media: Scientists map genetic codes of 3000 dangerous bacteria Professor Julian Parkhill’s group at the Wellcome Sanger Institute (WSI) and Pacific Biosciences featured together with the NCTC team in multiple media articles in June 2018 after we reached the important milestone of having sequenced DNA from 3000 NCTC bacteria.
August 2018
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Research in focus: Hyper virulent Klebsiella pneumoniae Hyper virulent Klebsiella pneumoniae is an emergent pathogen requiring harmonised surveillance between clinical microbiology laboratories. Further study into its epidemiology and its ability to acquire and retain antimicrobial resistance characteristics is of significant importance.
August 2018
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Buffalo Pox In 2005, pustular lesions were noticed on the foot of a burns patient in Karachi, Pakistan. Similar lesions subsequently appeared on at least 19 other patients in the city’s burns units. As part of the investigation into the infection, biopsies were sent to Public Health England Porton for specialist testing.
August 2018
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NCTC 10455 – a reference control for a bla-FRI variant Healthcare settings are responding to the emergence and spread of carbapenemase-producing Enterobacteriaceae (CPE) by introducing routine rectal screening for those patients at risk of CPE carriage.
August 2018
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The measles virus is highly contagious and infects millions of individuals worldwide. It causes serious disease in over 10 million children and accounts for about 120,000 deaths each year.
July 2018
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Calling all Technology Transfer Offices New and modified cell lines generated by universities and not for profit organisations are key in enabling ECACC to expand and keep its cell line collections relevant to the current needs of life science research. Working closely together has provided many benefits for both partners
July 2018
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Memoirs of ECACC Chris Morris was a longstanding member of the ECACC team who retired in 2017. In this piece he reminisces on his time in ECACC, the path of his career and the people he has worked with along the way.
July 2018
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Free webinar - Growing Pains: Cell Culture Challenges and Best Practices This webinar covered several topics including standardisation of training, steps for improving reproducibility of culture setup and maintenance, the importance of authenticating cell lines and the challenges posed by novel cell culture systems such as iPSC, organoids and complex 3D cell culture.
July 2018
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ECACC's Advanced Cell Culture Workshop: An overview The objectives of the workshop were to provide a forum where industry and academic experts could present on developing models and systems that recapitulate human biology in the lab, increasing the physiological relevance of experiments whilst reducing reliance on animal models.
July 2018
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Applying good cell culture practice to novel systems The emergence of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC), organoids and complex 3D cell culture offer huge potential for increasingly physiologically relevant in vitro models but also offer a novel set of challenges for the implementation of good cell culture practice.
July 2018
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We were sorry to learn that Dr Roland Nardone passed away on 20th June 2018. Roland had a passionate belief that science must be reproducible and became a leading pioneer in alerting the biomedical scientific community to the widespread global problem of misidentified cell lines in life science research. He devoted himself to promoting and resolving this issue from 2005.
June 2018
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Arborvirus new leaflet download Several emerging and re-emerging neglected diseases and zoonoses (infections that can pass between animals and humans) are caused by arboviruses, with vaccines available for only a few of these infections.
June 2018
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Three Species D Adenovirus Isolated from Patients with AIDS Whole Genome Sequenced
Three species D adenoviruses isolated from the faeces of AIDS patients in the UK, have been whole genome sequenced and are now available from NCPV.
May 2018
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NCPV 500: An Electronic Resource for Mining Viral Genomes
NCPV 500 is collaboration between Public Health England and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (WTSI) to produce 500 viral genomes from PHE’s National Collection of Pathogenic Viruses (NCPV) using the Illumina sequencing platform.
May 2018
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The rise and rise of bacteriophages
Read our update on NCTC 3000 the collaborative bacterial Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) project between Public Health England (PHE), Pacific BioSciences (PacBio) and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (WTSI).
May 2018
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An Update on NCTC3000: A Type Culture Reference Genome Project
Read our update on NCTC 3000 the collaborative bacterial Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) project between Public Health England (PHE), Pacific BioSciences (PacBio) and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (WTSI).
May 2018
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The Role of Proteomics in the National Collection of Type Cultures
Proteomics studies proteins in protein complexes, organelles or organisms and represents a challenging and complex discipline of biology. NCTC is fortunate to have two proteomics scientists dedicated to applying proteomic technologies to NCTC strains.
May 2018
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In vitro Modelling of the Gut Brain Axis and Microbiome for Neurodegenerative Diseases
The human microbiome is a complicated ecosystem. The gut microbiome is essential to healthy neuronal development and it has been shown that germ-free upbringing of mice induces significant permanent neurodevelopmental deficit.
May 2018
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Advanced cell culture systems for investigating microbe-host interactions
3D cell culture technology can assist in the study of microbe-host interactions in a setting which better represents in vivo physiological conditions.
April 2018
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ECACC one day workshop - Advanced Cell Culture: A Practical Approach
Register now for your space at our one day workshop in London.
April 2018
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Antibiotic resistance - a significant challenge to public health microbiology
Read our ResearchGate post on how NCTC bacterial strains can be used to better understand antibiotic resistance and enhance antibiotic research.
March 2018
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Usutu virus: A new addition to the NCPV catalogue
Usutu is an old world flavivirus of increasing notoriety. The virus was first isolated in South Africa in 1959 and was named after the Usutu River in Swaziland. The typical Usutu life cycle involves both mosquitos and birds, and infection within mammals remains uncommon.
March 2018
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The Aspergillus fumigatus genome-wide knockout collection
On the 1st January 2018 a team led by Dr Mike Bromley at the University of Manchester embarked on a Wellcome Trust funded project named COFUN that aims to generate knockout mutants for all of the coding genes in the human pathogen Aspergillus fumigatus.
January 2018
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Breaking the mould (and the yeasts) in biomedical research – NCPF in 2017
Candida and Aspergillus are the most prevalent fungal infections in hospitals but other species cannot be neglected. A research group in Spain have described a PCR-assay to help obtain a more rapid and accurate identification of Saprochaete capitata.
January 2018
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NCPF in Research: Update on the emerging pathogen Candida auris in the UK
After its first description in 2009, C. auris had rapidly emerged as an important cause of nosocomial infections across several continents, with large outbreaks in hospitals in South Africa, India, parts of North and South America, Spain and the UK.
January 2018
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Anaerobes are often perceived as less important in clinical microbiology compared to their aerobic counterparts. The complexities of infections caused by anaerobes are still not fully understood
January 2018
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Within NCTC, great care is taken when authenticating all bacteria within the collection. Fastidious anaerobes pose a unique challenge.
January 2018
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Blood, sweat and sequencing – NCTC in 2017
A collaborative study by researchers in Thailand and the UK identified a novel antibacterial peptide derived from Crocodylus siamensis haemoglobin that causes bacterial death.
January 2018
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From Antivirals to Zika: NCPV in 2017
A study by researchers based in the UK and US used an NCPV strain of human rhinovirus (HRV strain 1B) to demonstrate a potential role for cathelicins as part of a therapeutic strategy for rhinovirus infection.
January 2018
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Viruses contain nucleic acid as RNA or DNA. These molecules possess all the genetic information of the virus. Research involving the use of viral nucleic acid products, are becoming increasing popular.
January 2018
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Chikungunya virus causes a painful, crippling disease, and is transmitted by infected mosquitoes. The name is derived from a native language of Tanzania, and refers to the stooped, contorted appearance of sufferers with severe joint pain.
January 2018
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100 tiny steps - ECACC in research 2017
Microwaves have been used with some success as cancer therapy; scientists in Japan used an ECACC human breast cancer cell line to provide evidence to support the use normothermic microwave irradiation in clinical cancer treatment; just one example of the role of ECACC cell lines in improving our understanding of non-communicable diseases.
January 2018
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There are still a limited amount of spaces on our Fundamentals of Cell Culture: Key Principles and Practice training course in March. Register now to secure your space.
January 2018
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UK Biological Resource Centre Network
The UKBRCN is a network of UK biological collections including PHE's four Culture Collections. The group meets annually and aims provide support to collections and their users on topics such as the Nagoya Protocol, and also aims to foster active collaborative links within the biological resource community.
December 2017
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Are you starting a PhD in microbiology?
Get your research off to the best start. Don’t lose precious time trouble-shooting reagents. By obtaining biological materials from the Culture Collections of Public Health England, you can move straight to addressing the exciting questions.
December 2017
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Variety and applications of Nucleic Acid products
Genetic researchers are now learning more about how individual genes work and what they do and study the role that variations in genes play in disease. ECACC provides nucleic acids in a range of formats from its many hundreds of human cell lines to help researchers with their studies.
November 2017
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Optimisation of cryo-preservation of chick embryo fibroblast cells
Chick embryo fibroblasts (CEF) are a useful cellular reagent in virology as they support the growth of many human and animal pathogenic viruses. This study has helped ECACC establish reproducible cell banks of CEF that can be used directly for virus propagation and titration without the need for reverting to primary tissue preparation.
November 2017
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NCTC and Antimicrobial Medicine: Past, present and future
The 18th of November marked European Antibiotic Awareness Day. NCTC has a proud history of supporting the development of antimicrobial medicine and continues to provide biological materials used in the harmonized measurement of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and bio-resources for modern AMR research.
November 2017
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Growth media: not all culture media is the same
In general terms cultured cells require a sterile environment and a supply of nutrients for growth. In addition, the culture environment should be stable in terms of pH and temperature. Over the last 30 years various defined basal media types have been developed and are now available commercially.
November 2017
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Implementation of the Nagoya Protocol: an update
Life science research and microbiological diagnostics rely on access to global genetic resources. In 2014, the Nagoya Protocol came into force. It aims to provide a framework for legal clarity to be achieved for providers and users of genetic resources regarding fair access and sharing of any benefits arising from use.
November 2017
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Celebrating Ten Years of Human Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells
2017 marks the 10th anniversary of the first human induced pluripotent stem cells (HiPSC) and the year of ECACC’s global launch of its collections of over 1,000 HiPSC cell lines (HipSci and EBiSC).
November 2017
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NCTC: We can’t be experts in everything – so can you contribute?
From Abiotrophia adiacens to Zymomonas mobilis, NCTC microbiologists work with nearly 6000 bacterial strains from more than 900 distinct species in at least 83 different families. The methods used to authenticate the strains ranges from simple microscopy to whole genome sequencing.
November 2017
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Webinar - iPSCs: the future of disease research. The development of human iPSC technology offers researchers the ability to more accurately generate physiologically relevant models of disease and normal tissues in the laboratory. Advances in iPSC generation have allowed laboratories to make their own cell lines; however, researchers rarely have the resources needed to establish stocks, undertake quality control and share their own de novo iPSC cell lines.
October 2017
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In August 2017 Eleanor Hill, became the 100th placement student within Public Health (PHE) to complete the Registration Training Portfolio for the IBMS Certificate of Competence. Eleanor, Biomedical Science undergraduate from De Montfort University, spent a year in the NCTC laboratory gaining experience in microbiological techniques and working in a professional setting in addition to working towards the Portfolio.
October 2017
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Thousands of living species are newly described every year and in the microbial world the tree of life is expanding dramatically due to the identification of previously unknown lineages through genome analysis. For bacteria, the first isolate of a confirmed new species, the type strain, must be deposited within two internationally recognised culture collections
October 2017
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New species of bacteria are constantly being discovered and described. These new species may differ only slightly or much more significantly from those already described and can be isolated from a variety of sources, including from clinical specimens.
October 2017
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A recent study published by Horbach and Halffmann (2017) reports on the number of ‘contaminated’ papers in scientific literature in which misidentified cell lines are used. The number of articles referring to misidentified cell lines is still increasing and a ‘fair and reasonable notifications system’ is therefore required to raise awareness of this issue.
October 2017
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Informed consent - ensuring clinical samples are obtained ethically Researchers working with biological samples taken from both animals and humans need to know that the material they are working with has been obtained legally, ethically and with due consideration for the wellbeing, privacy and dignity of the donor.
October 2017
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Current therapeutic strategies for a variety of inherited cardiac conditions are mostly symptomatic. Cardiac myocytes (CMs) derived from disease-specific iPSCs represent a novel in vitro system with an unprecedented potential for generating new mechanistic insight into diseases pathophysiology and enabling enhanced assessment of drug efficacy and safety.
October 2017
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NCTC 3000 is a collaborative Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) project that was established in 2013 between Public Health England (PHE), the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (WTSI) and Pacific Biosciences (PacBio). Search the new list of sequenced NCTC strains to find genomes that interest you.
September 2017
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Webinar: Cell Line Solutions for Assay Development and Bioproduction Cultivating and managing productive cell cultures is of critical importance to the biopharmaceutical industry. Recent discoveries using stem cells, advances in cell based therapeutics, and the rapid expansion of the biosimilar market has investigators searching for technologies that will improve their research workflows.
September 2017
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NCPF in research: MALDI-ToF mass spectrometry for the identification of eumycetoma agents and related fungi The PHE Mycology Reference Laboratory (MRL) has undertaken studies relating to fungi that cause black grain mycetoma. Black grain eumycetoma is a chronic fungal infection and many different fungal species are known to cause it including Madurella species, Falciformispora species and Trematosphaeria grisea.
August 2017
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NCTC is reviewing the toxigenic status of the Corynebacterium strains it curates. Provision of authenticated reference cultures along with comprehensive phenotypic data is an essential part of supporting public health efforts, research and promoting safety in the scientific community.
August 2017
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A first glance through the 2017 publications citing NCTC bacteria reveals a fascinating insight into the reference strains’ continued importance in emerging microbial developments. Recent focus on microbiomes has changed ideas about the role of microorganisms in human and animal health and disease, and antimicrobial resistance remains a global challenge.
August 2017
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NCPV has recenetly added a number of Mumps virus strains of differing genotypes to the collection. Earlier this year a Canadian news channel reported that five Canadian ice hockey players had been side-lined due to mumps. One player’s jaw was so swollen that he assumed it was broken. In the UK mumps is a notifiable infection and high profile outbreaks are often associated with festivals and certain high risk populations.
August 2017
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ECACC has recently launched a new service for human cell line authentication by STR profiling. The process is simple and quick; cells are spotted onto an FTA card and sent for analysis by post at ambient temperature. To help researchers understand the STR profile and report, ECCAC have created several resources on STR profile interpretation.
26 July 2017
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Depositing a cell line with ECACC: the strengths of quality control, storage and distribution Cell lines are increasingly critical tools for life science research and as concerns over scientific reproducibility grow, it is essential that they are of known origin, and they are valid in terms of identity, freedom from microbial contamination and function. ECACC maintains secure master and working banks of cryopreserved stocks of the cell lines in its collection.
27 June 2017
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NCTC is working to provide authenticated reference strains of Mycobacterium chimaera. The type strain is now available as NCTC 13781.Until fairly recently M.chimaera was a low profile microorganism in the sphere of human infection. However, this changed in 2014 when six cases of severe infection were reported in cardiac surgery patients in Zurich.
27 June 2017
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Many researchers use NCTC strains during the development, evaluation and validation of laboratory methods. A team at Queen’s University, Belfast, UK, used NCTC Mycobacteria strains to evaluate an assay for the rapid detection of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis (MAP) in milk. MAP causes Johne’s disease (JD), a chronic enteric wasting disease that affects domestic ruminants.
27 June 2017
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Making cell lines more physiologically relevant for toxicology testing: how sugar may not help the medicine go down Thanks to their accessibility, ease of use and suitability for high throughput analysis, cancer derived human cell lines are useful laboratory tools for the screening of the effectiveness and toxicology of potential new drugs.
22 June 2017
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Conservation through cell culture ECACC currently supplies a number of cell lines which were established from species listed under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna - CITES. Scientists can be reassured that the use of these cell lines means that no additional animals have been taken from the wild, or from captive bred colonies to provide biological samples for research use.
22 June 2017
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Upcoming webinar with Stefan Przyborski More sophisticated models are developing as 3D cell culture technology becomes established and accepted as a means of creating more physiologically relevant cell-based assays. Methods that are relatively straightforward to use and that recreate the organized structure of real tissues will become valuable research tools for use in discovery, validation studies, and modeling disease.
06 June 2017
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Hazard Group 3 bacteria in the NCTC collection In the UK, biological agents are classified into four Hazard Groups (HG1-4). Similar categorisations of biological agents are also seen in other parts of the world. The majority of bacteria within the NCTC collection fall within the HG2 category, however the collection also holds over 500 strains of HG3 bacteria.
26 May 2017
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ECACC: Supporting life science research and technology transfer ECACC has worked closely with UK Research Councils, charities and universities’ Technology Transfer offices to increase the range and relevance of the cell lines available from ECACC for life science research. Working closely with a single contact within a research establishment enables us to fast-track new cell lines into ECACC, making them available for the wider research community as quickly as possible.
25 May 2017
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10 Years of Human Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells: From Theory to Accessible Research Tools In 2006 Professor Shinya Yamanaka first presented the work of his team showing that just four transcription factors were required to transform a skin cell into a pluripotent stem cell. This technology is now called reprogramming and the cells generated from its use are termed induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells.
25 May 2017
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Exophiala campbellii: a new fungal species. The Mycology Reference Laboratory recently undertook a study of Exophiala species contained within the NCPF collection to see they could distinguish between them using MALDI-ToF technology. Read Dr Elizabeth Johnson’s account of how this investigation led to the identification of a new species.
24 May 2017
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Cell culture is a critical tool for biological science research. For over 30 years ECACC has been instrumental in the education of cell culture scientists through its regular and internationally renowned cell culture training courses and it is estimated that over this time around a thousand delegates have received direct training at the hands of ECACC staff.
15 May 2017
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NCPF in research: A new species responsible for black grain mycetoma has been identified. Phylogenetic analyses of 31 isolates that were historically classified as Madurella greisea has given rise to the identification of a new species. The clinical isolates from two international collections were all associated with cases of black-grain mycetoma infection in humans.
03 May 2017
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Cell culture: useful websites and publications. There is a growing need for standardisation to enable reproducibility within life science research. As our reliance on in vitro methodologies increases, it is important that researchers have access to resources that help guide workflow and experimental design, and provide basic and up to date guidance to help overcome common pitfalls and challenges encountered in cell culture.
19 April 2017
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STR profiling using FTA cards for human cell line authentication. ECACC can now offer an STR profiling cell line authentication service where cells are simply spotted onto a special (FTA) card and sent for profiling at ambient temperature. This negates the need to extract DNA from cell pellets and removes the cold chain distribution required for sending cell pellets on dry ice.
19 April 2017
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EBiSC to develop next generation Alzheimer's disease iPSC lines. Gene editing in induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells) has within the last couple of years emerged as a valuable tool. One of the most powerful applications is the generation of isogenic lines for patient specific disease modeling.
19 April 2017
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NCTC must endure as a dynamic collection of bacteria, accessible and significant to the biomedical scientific community. With this objective in mind we have recently added five new strains that can be used as positive controls for detecting beta-lactamase genes.
19 April 2017
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Murray, microbes, and me - The life of the microbiologist and clinician Professor Everitt Murray is the focus of a recent article in The Microbiology Society’s publication Microbial Genomics. The article by Kate Baker charts Murray’s career and involvement with NCTC.
07 April 2017
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3D culture systems are used in many biological science disciplines including cell biology, immunology, tissue engineering and cancer and stem cell research. This technology can assist in the study of virus-host interactions in a setting which better represents in vivo physiological conditions; tissue-like constructs which are similar to their equivalents in vivo are present allowing for more in depth, accurate and relevant investigations to occur.
29 March 2017
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Lyophilisation, also known as freeze-drying, is a preservation method achieved through dehydration. The process was developed initially in 1906 and the technique currently applied by NCTC is an adaptation of the method used during World War II to preserve and transport blood serum.
15 March 2017
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Setting up an inverted phase contrast microscope for tissue culture Often microscope users are unaware of how to set up an inverted microscope and either suffer from low quality images or adopt a trial an error approach to try to improve results. Understanding how to set up the microscope properly can save time and greatly increase the quality of images and data generated from cell cultures
13 March 2017
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International Women's Day 2017 Historically women have experienced greater barriers to the same opportunities afforded to men and hostility from the scientific establishment (among others), breeding a range of problems. For the first time in its history the majority of the National Collection of Type Cultures’ (NCTC) senior scientists and curators are women. We pay tribute to the women who shaped and contributed to one of the world’s oldest working bacterial collections as it exists today.
08 March 2017
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You can now learn about the authenticated viral strains and services provided by the National Collection of Pathogenic Viruses (NCPV) in our new brochure. The brochure helps virologists and quality control scientists understand the range of viral strains relevant to human health that are available from NCPV, their applications and the benefits of depositing their own viral strains in the collection.
02 March 2017
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Approximately one fifth of the bacteria in NCTC are cultures of type strains, which are the strains on which the description of a species is based. A bacterial species invariably includes multiple strains that are of common origin and show more similarity to each other than to any other strain. We could consider the type strains to be the most important strains in NCTC because they are the points of reference that other strains must be compared with when determining which species they belong to.
15 February 2017
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Salmonella infection is a major global cause of foodborne disease and is frequently transmitted as a result of the consumption of contaminated foods of animal origin; contamination in animal feed is known to be a contributing factor. Rapid methods for identifying Salmonella-free samples are being developed which have the potential to reduce the turnaround time for negative results from three to two days.
15 February 2017
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Reproducibility in pre-clinical life science research. Reproducibility forms the foundation of meaningful scientific research and is an issue which is causing increasing concern. The causes are complex and include lack of validation of key biological reagents and reference material (including cell lines), poor study design, inadequate data analysis and reporting and a lack of robust laboratory protocols.
14 February 2017
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CHO cell lines expressing Fcγ receptors – an in vitro tool for antibody based drug discovery. New CHO cell line variants, expressing different classes of Fc gamma receptors (FcγRs) have been deposited exclusively into the ECACC General Collection by Cambridge Enterprise Limited, UK. The variant lines were developed in the laboratory of Dr. Mike Clark at Cambridge University and include five cell lines that express three different human FcγRs including allotypes of FcγRIIa and FcγRIIIa.
14 February 2017
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ECACC cell lines in research: 2016
A review of 80 scientific publications citing the use of ECACC cell lines, published on line during 2016, emphasises the value of cell lines as tools in our quest to understand and combat human diseases. The use of 88 different ECACC cell lines was cited by authors affiliated to organisations in 36 countries, with significant focus on the pathogenesis and treatment of human cancers.
13 February 2017
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Yellow fever virus is an arbovirus of the Flaviviridae family, pathogenic to humans, and transmitted by mosquitoes (Aedes and Haemogogus species). It is endemic in tropical areas of Africa and South America and although vaccination is available, take-up is low in some endemic areas. In 2015/2016 a large outbreak occurred in Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo, and in Brazil this year, 47 cases have been confirmed and there have been 45 deaths.
26 January 2017
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NCPV’s global impact in 2016. During 2016 NCPV was at the forefront of the global response to the outbreak of Zika virus that has affected people in up to 70 countries across South America, the Caribbean and the Western Pacific Region since October 2013. We supplied live Zika virus strains or RNA from NCPV Zika strains to 50 different groups of scientists in 16 countries. NCPV also made publically available the first Zika virus strain with extensive genome sequence data isolated from a semen sample
25 January 2017
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Hannah McGregor, Quality Control Supervisor at NCTC, tells us about her public engagement activities in 2016.
I am very lucky to work for NCTC - not only because I work with some extraordinary and historical bacteria on a daily basis, but I get the opportunity to share my passion for microbiology with members of the public and potential future scientists.
19 January 2017
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NCTC: New bacterial strains in 2016. We made a record number of bacterial strains available from the NCTC online catalogue in 2016. In total, 98 strains from 20 families were added , a quarter of which were Type strains. Many were included in the NCTC_3000 whole genome sequencing project under taken with the Sanger Institute and PacBio.
19 January 2017
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ECACC offers several thousand cell lines to researchers; the majority of these require serum for growth, which presents the problem of deciding on a suitable supply. Many laboratories batch test sera by setting up multiple cultures, and then performing cell counts at fixed time points. This is time consuming and requires duplicate counts at every time point to provide sufficient accuracy. At ECACC we have developed an automated method using an IncuCyte live cells analysis system.
19 January 2017
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NCPF in Research: Phaeohyphomycosis cyst associated with M. romeroi infection. Typically these phaeohyphomycocis infections are caused by fungal species such as Exophiala, Alternaria, Cladophialophora, Phialophora or Curvularia/Bipolaris species. Medicopsis species has also been implicated. This case study reports the occurrence of an infection at an intravenus cannula site.
11 January 2017
CO2 Concentration and pH Control in the Cell Culture Laboratory
Most cell culture laboratories will have a humidified Carbon Dioxide (CO2) incubator set to 5%, however it is not always obvious why our cultures need this amount of CO2, nor what the acceptable tolerances are for the ranges in concentration.
July 2019