Descrizione

The Experimental Immunology platform enables the study and development of cell-based therapies, with a strong focus on clinical application to patients. This means that cell production and activation protocols must comply with Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) regulations.

In addition, it is essential to obtain cellular products in clinically relevant quantities, which typically represents a major challenge. In our laboratory, we have developed and patented a protocol to obtain high numbers of NK cells starting from a waste product, namely liver perfusate—the liver wash fluid collected from a deceased donor.

Finally, we have established a method to efficiently expand NK cells, enabling the generation of billions of cells within a few weeks.

Competenze

• Expertise in cell culture; isolation of cells from various biological sources (liver perfusate, peripheral blood, cord blood, tissues); functional and phenotypic characterization of target cell populations; large-scale cell expansion in compliance with Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) standards; in vivo proof-of-concept studies in small animal models; preparation of scientific publications; and genetic engineering of primary cells using retroviral and lentiviral vectors.

Dotazione tecnologica

Software

• Schrodinger suite for small molecule drug discovery;
• LigandScout expert suite;
• Autodock and Autodock Vina;
• Desmond (OPLS2005 and OPLS3e);
• AMBER;
• NAMD;
• VMD;
• Gromacs;
• RDKit;
• KNIME.

Hardware

• 6 Workstations;
  
• Server in HPC mode: 200 CPUs and 2 x NVIDIA Tesla K80.

Computational capacity:

• Library optimisation → ~ 6,000 molecules/min
  
• Virtual Screening HTVS → ~ 5,000 molecules/min
  
• Virtual Screening SP → ~ 1,500 molecules/min
  
• Molecular Dynamics → ~ 200 ns/day/GPU (on an average system of 40,000 atoms)
  

Integrated in silico platform

The group is developing an integrated platform for the study of molecular networks in collaboration with the bioinformatics group.