A method of creating a reperfusion injury can include: providing a cell culture device having an internal chamber with at least one port coupled to a perfusion modulating system capable of modulating perfusion in the internal chamber, wherein the internal chamber includes a cell culture; perfusing a fluid through the internal chamber with the perfusion modulating system, wherein the perfusion modulating system includes at least one pump; reducing fluid flow through the internal chamber; reperfusing fluid flow through the internal chamber; and creating a reperfusion injury in the cell culture by the reperfusion of the fluid flow through the internal chamber. The cell culture includes at least one type of tissue cell. The cell culture can include a tissue construct formed of hydrogel and/or extracellular matrix.

Disclosed herein are methods for the generation of highly accurate oligonucleic acid libraries encoding for predetermined variants of a nucleic acid sequence. The degree of variation may be complete, resulting in a saturated variant library, or less than complete, resulting in a selective library of variants. The variant oligonucleic acid libraries described herein may designed for further processing by transcription or translation. The variant oligonucleic acid libraries described herein may be designed to generate variant RNA, DNA and/or protein populations. Further provided herein are method for identifying variant species with increased or decreased activities, with applications in regulating biological functions and the design of therapeutics for treatment or reduction of disease.

Disclosed herein are devices and methods for measuring the effect of chemokines and electric fields on cell migration. This approach is inherently non-contact and does not require injection of current. For example, disclosed herein is a device for assessing cell migration that comprises a cell migration chamber and an electromagnet positioned to produce a uniform electric field across the length of the chamber. Also disclosed is a method for assaying a cell that involves loading cells into the disclosed device along with a chemokine in an amount to produce a chemokine gradient, activating the electromagnet to produce an electric field across the cell migration chamber, and imaging the cells to measure the dual effect of the chemokine and the electric field on the cells.

A device includes an input chamber, an attractant chamber, a migration channel arranged in fluid communication between an outlet of the input chamber and inlet of the attractant chamber, a baffle arranged in fluid communication between the outlet of the input chamber and the migration channel or within the migration channel, and an exit channel in fluid communication with the migration channel at a point beyond the baffle and before the migration channel enters the inlet of the attractant chamber. The baffle is configured to inhibit movement of a first type of cell through the baffle to a greater extent than the baffle inhibits movement of a second type of cell through the baffle.

A method of inducing ischemia includes: providing a cell culture device having a first cell culture in an internal chamber and a second cell culture in at least one fluid channel and a perfusion modulating system that causes changes in oxygen flow in the internal chamber and/or at least one fluid channel; flowing liquid media having oxygen through the internal chamber and at least one fluid channel of the cell culture device; modulating oxygen perfusion in the internal chamber with the perfusion modulating system by varying and selectively blocking the flow rate of at least one of the liquid media or oxygen through the internal chamber to induce varying levels of ischemia; and assaying for ischemia in the first cell culture.

Devices are for assessing the migration response in the presence of a stable encapsulated gradient of a factor or factor combination, and quantifying the adherence response inside micro-channels in the presence of different factors. A platform is for obtaining information relating to migration score or the quantification of adhered cells through use of the devices, and it allows this information to be used to assess therapeutic potential. A method quantifies the cells migration response and the cell adherence response.

An agent for promoting migration of pluripotent stem cells containing an extract from inflamed tissues inoculated with vaccinia virus. An extract from inflamed tissues inoculated with vaccinia virus promotes migration of Muse cells. Thus, the agent for promoting migration of pluripotent stem cells for various diseases to which migration of pluripotent stem cells may have an advantageous effect.

The present invention describes an integrated apparatus that enables identification of invasive tumor cells directly from a specimen. The methods using the apparatus can be used to prognose or predict the survivability of the cancer in a subject and the risk of recurrence of the cancer in the subject after treatment. The methods disclosed herein can be used to determine which chemotherapeutic or other therapies most strongly inhibit the tumor cells invasiveness as a form of personalized therapy.

The invention relates to a La-1-like peptide agent that increases sperm motility. It is non-toxic and it may be used to treat male infertility in humans, and also to increase fertility in animals. It may be used in artificial reproductive techniques such as in vitro fertilisation (IVF), including intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI). The La-1 like peptide agent may also be used in artificial insemination techniques such as intra-cytoplasmic uterine injection (IUI).

Disclosed herein is method and system for determining quality of semen sample. Trajectories of objects, identified in each of plurality of image frames of semen sample, are generated by tracking movement of the objects across image frames, and compensating a drift velocity of the semen sample. Further, generated trajectories are classified into sperm and non-sperm trajectories. Finally, total concentration estimate and total motility estimate of the semen sample are computed to generate a semen quality index, which indicates quality of the semen sample. In an embodiment, the method of present disclosure uses a multi-level Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) analysis technique for effectively classifying the object trajectories into sperm and non-sperm objects. Also, since the present method includes estimating and compensating drift velocity in the semen sample, it enhances overall accuracy of motility estimation and semen quality analysis.