Characterization of Cellular Viability Using Label-Free Brightfield Live-Cell Imaging

Area of Science:

• Drug discovery and development
• Cell biology
• Chemical biology

Background:

• Chemogenomic libraries are crucial for phenotypic screening.
• Annotating compound effects on cellular viability is essential to differentiate on-target activity from cytotoxicity.
• Accurate compound quality control requires robust viability assays.

Purpose of the Study:

• To provide a standardized protocol for determining compound effects on cellular viability.
• To establish a method for initial compound quality control in phenotypic screening.
• To differentiate cytotoxic effects from specific on-target compound activity.

Main Methods:

• Utilizing the Incucyte live-cell imaging system for real-time monitoring.
• Calculating compound-induced changes in cellular growth rates.
• Classifying compound effects as cytotoxic, cytostatic, or healthy outcomes.

Main Results:

• The protocol effectively quantifies compound effects on cell viability.
• Compounds are reliably categorized based on their impact on cellular growth rates.
• This method serves as a primary screen for compound quality assessment.

Conclusions:

• The presented protocol is a valuable tool for initial compound quality control in chemogenomic library screening.
• Assessing cellular viability is a critical first step to ensure the reliability of phenotypic screening data.
• This approach aids researchers in prioritizing compounds with specific biological activity over those causing general toxicity.