A paper has demonstrated a new characteristic in Biostatus' Draq5 far-red fluorescent dye that could lead to opportunities in the area of in vitro toxicology within drugs development.
The paper, recently published in Toxicological Sciences on mitochondrial dysfunction in the cytotoxic effects of anti-depressants shows great promise for high content biology applied to in vitro toxicology.
As part of the study, the authors - Dykens et al of Pfizer - developed a novel fluorescence-based imaging assay to report different cytotoxic effects on primary human hepatocytes.
Following drug exposure, cells were stained with probes to test for mitochondrial membrane potential, presence of reactive oxygen species, glutathione levels, and finally the far-red fluorescent dye Draq5 for cell number/nuclear DNA and, most notably, intracellular lipids.
This is the first demonstration of Draq5 to show drug-induced intracellular accumulation of (phospho)lipid vesicles in addition to providing information, as a live cell DNA reporter, on nuclear morphology and cell numbers.
