Application Note: Gentle Dispensing Technology Ensures High Cell Viability

Cell biology researchers face persistent challenges when handling and analyzing cells, especially when traditional cell sorting technologies can damage cells through physical stress and shear forces. To help overcome these limitations, our latest Application Note—“Detecting Growth, Death and Viability of Dispensed Cells in Glass Nanowell Dishes”—explores how the CellShepherd Platform enables gentle, high-viability cell dispensing. It’s a critical step forward for researchers working with valuable primary cells or conducting single-cell analysis.

The Challenge: Cell Viability in Sorting and Dispensing

Cell sorting is notoriously harsh on cells. The high-pressure nozzles and intense fluid dynamics often used in traditional methods can significantly reduce cell viability and compromise proliferation capacity. This presents a major obstacle for researchers working with limited or sensitive samples.

Too often, scientists are forced to choose between maintaining cell health and conducting detailed analysis—a trade-off that can undermine experimental results and limit discovery potential.

Key Findings: Proven Performance with K562 Cells

To evaluate CellShepherd’s performance, we conducted experiments using K562 cells—a widely used human tumor cell line in cancer research. Over a four-day period, we tracked cell viability and growth post-dispensing using SYTOX™ Green Nucleic Acid Stain to differentiate live and dead cells.

The findings reveal strong performance across several areas:

High post-dispensing viability – Nearly 90% immediately after dispensing, reaching 95% by day 3
Uninhibited cell growth – Average doubling time of 26.3 hours, well within the expected 20–30 hour range
Clear differentiation – Between live and dead cells using standard fluorescent dyes
High-quality imaging – Maintained throughout the growth process, even as cell populations expanded

A plot showing the total amount of live (blue) and dead (striped) K562 cells in all counted wells of the same dish, from Day 0 to Day 4. A secondary line (green) shows the average doubling time of K562, of which the error bars represent the lower and higher-end of 20 and 30 hours respectively.

Why This Matters for Your Research

These findings highlight how CellShepherd is uniquely positioned to support more reliable, long-term cell studies. Here’s why that matters:

The CellShepherd platform tackles critical pain points in cell analysis workflows through its gentle dispensing technology and micro-structured glass nanowells (400 x 400 µm). This innovative system delivers several key advantages:

Preserves cell viability during handling and dispensing
Enables long-term monitoring of cell populations at the single-cell level
Provides superior optical quality for detailed imaging analysis

Housed in a climate-controlled, sterile environment, the platform also supports real-time imaging through brightfield and three fluorescent channels. AI-driven analysis allows clear identification of live versus dead cells while supporting uninhibited suspension cell growth.

These capabilities are especially valuable across a variety of research fields:

Cancer research – Monitor tumor cell behavior and treatment responses
Immunology – Analyze NK cell activity and immune responses
Stem cell research and drug discovery – Track differentiation and assess compound effects

For researchers handling precious samples, this means more reliable data, expanded experimental possibilities, and the opportunity to achieve breakthroughs that traditional sorting methods may not support.