Cleveland, Ohio (PRWEB) May 08, 2014

ChanTest announces a new Heart-in-a-Dish in vitro cardiac safety assessment tool to support this critical component of the drug development process for biopharmaceutical companies.

ChanTest has developed this breakthrough in safety assessment by taking advantage of the pairing of two recent technologies stem cell-derived human cardiomyocytes, and Multi-Electrode Array (MEA) recording -- to open a new avenue toward simplifying the cardiac risk assessment process.

Adult human cells can be reprogrammed to simulate induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC). These iPSCs can be differentiated into heart cells (myocytes) and can be grown in culture dishes to form a spontaneously beating layer of myocytes that display the electrical properties similar to an intact human heart.

With the application of multiple electrodes, this Heart-in-a-Dish will generate a signal that closely resembles an EKG which has been recorded in the doctors office. Now imagine a miniature version of this system. By miniaturizing the recording system in the form of multi-well MEA assay plates, this enables simultaneous, parallel measurements from this Heart-in-a-Dish in order to detect potentially dangerous arrhythmias before human clinical trials.

This powerful system rapidly tests the safety of multiple compounds, at multiple concentrations and time points, explained Chris Mathes, Ph.D., Chief Commercial Officer at ChanTest. And the new offering keeps ChanTest on the cutting edge of providing services tuned to the current regulatory environment for drug discovery.

ChanTest has developed this Heart-in-a-Dish multi-well MEA assay that enables the recording of EKG-like signals to identify side effects from drugs. This new tool can allow biopharmaceutical companies and other drug discovery teams to screen compounds in an informative and robust manner, prior to implementing in vivo animal or human studies.

About ChanTest The Ion Channel Expert ChanTests mission is to serve the drug discovery and development needs of customers worldwide. Since its start in 1998, the Contract Research Organization has tested compounds for more than 300 global pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. ChanTest also partners with these companies to accelerate the drug development process for the release of better, safer drugs. ChanTest offers integrated ion channel and GPCR services (GLP and non-GLP) and reagents. The companys library of validated ion channel cell lines, and nonclinical cardiac risk assessment service portfolio, is the most comprehensive commercial library available today.

Because of ChanTests influential role in the cardiac safety field, along with the companys uncompromising commitment to quality, an independent survey has named ChanTest the most trusted and most used fee-for-service provider since 2006. ChanTest is based in Cleveland, Ohio.

Visit http://www.chantest.com to learn more about ChanTest.

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ChanTest Launches new Heart-in-a-Dish Cardiac Safety Assessment Tool