Thank you to everyone who participated in the recent ATCC Innovation Challenge! In this challenge, we called upon innovators throughout the scientific community to submit a proposal of how they are using ATCC's CAR-T target luciferase reporter cells and checkpoint luciferase reporter cells in new, interesting, or daring applications.

After receiving numerous submissions, we are pleased to announce the winners of the challenge below. We're proud to be a part of this incredible research and we look forward to these innovative ideas coming to fruition.

Nigel Reuel, Iowa State University
Monitoring cell-mediated cytotoxic activity in real time enables advanced control and detailed system dynamic studies. Currently, real-time cytotoxic assays are limited to impedance-based assays, which are targeted to adherent cells. In this study, the scientists developed a polymer-based sensor that mechanically responds to the metabolites secreted from living cells. Using this sensor, they observed different dynamic profiles at different NK92 and K562 coculture ratios; however, the response profiles were contributed by both cell types. To resolve the confounding signal, the team intends to utilize ATCC CAR-T Target Luciferase Reporter Cells to identify live target cells, thereby normalizing and benchmarking the response profiles. 

Rodrigo Cristofoletti, University of Florida
CAR-T cells are systemically administered for blood cancer and therefore have easy access to a target. In turn, solid tumor CAR-T therapy must surmount several obstacles, such as the tumor stroma that impede the penetration and homing of CAR-T cells. Cristofoletti and colleagues aim to assess HER2 CAR-T recruitment and killing cell using a novel, adaptable organ-chip workflow. The chip will be made of PDMS, containing two parallel microchannels separated by a porous membrane. The upper channel will be seeded with the BT-474-Luc2 CAR-T target luciferase reporter cell line (ATCC HTB-20-LUC2). HUVECs from ATCC will be then plated on the chip bottom channel. Chips will be used to model HER2 CAR-T cell recruitment from the vascular compartment into upper compartment populated with BT-474-Luc2 cells. In this research, they will leverage HER2 CAR-T cells expressing different constructs from ProMab Biotechnologies, Inc. and will investigate which chemokines would enhance each HER2 CAR-T recruitment and efficacy using multi-modal analysis, including confocal imaging and effluent analysis.

Weiping Tang, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Tang and colleagues previously reported lysosome targeting chimeras (LYTACs) that can recruit CIM6PR and ASGPR to degrade membrane proteins. However, none of the LYTACs reported by the team and others have high selectivity for cancer. They recently developed a class of unprecedented LYTACs that could degrade PD-L1 selectively on cancer cells while leaving the PD-L1 on normal tissues untouched. The cancer-selective PD-L1 degrader showed significantly higher anti-tumor efficacy over current PD-L1 blocking agents in their animal model. However, the low-throughput Western blot assay they currently use limited their ability to optimize the properties of the PD-L1 degraders. To address this issue, Tang and colleagues plan to use ATCC Checkpoint Luciferase Reporter Cells to optimize degraders for PD-L1 and develop degraders for CD-155 and B7-H3 with high selectivity for cancer cells. They will also be able to monitor the kinetics of the degradation using these reporter cell lines.