Real-time cytotoxicity assays

Validation of new therapeutic targets calls for the advance in innovative assays that probe both spatial and temporal relationships in signaling networks. Cell death assays have already found a widespread use in pharmacological profiling of anticancer drugs. Such assays are, however, predominantly restricted to end point DEAD/LIVE parameter that provides only a snapshot of inherently stochastic process such as tumor cell death. Development of new methods that can offer kinetic real-time analysis would be highly advantageous for the pharmacological screening and predictive toxicology. In the present work we outline innovative protocols for the real-time analysis of tumor cell death, based on propidium iodide (PI) and SYTOX Green probes. These can be readily adapted to both flow cytometry and time-lapse fluorescence imaging. Considering vast time savings and kinetic data acquisition such assays have the potential to be applied in a number of areas including accelerated anticancer drug discovery and high-throughput screening routines.