Cell Culture Inserts

Features

BD Biosciences offers a variety of surfaces and pore sizes with clear and fluorescent blocking membranes.

BD Falcon™ and BD BioCoat™ cell culture inserts come in 6-, 12-, and 24-well individual formats and 24- and 96-multiwell formats with 0.4, 1, 3, and 8 µm membrane pore sizes. Cell culture inserts are available in tissue-culture treated and biological surface treatments including BD Matrigel™ matrix, fibronectin, collagen and laminin. The BD Gentest™ pre-coated PAMPA plate system provides a highly reproducible system for screening passive transport of drug compounds.

Minimize loss of small molecules with PET membrane inserts

Low binding properties of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) minimize the loss of small molecules, including low molecular weight proteins and other natural and synthetic compounds, making the membrane ideal for transport or intercellular communications studies. Due to the low-protein binding property of PET membranes, BD Falcon™ cell culture inserts are especially suited for immunohistochemistry, co-culture to study intercellular communication, small molecule drug transport studies, and drug screening.

Enable more consistent data with biological coated inserts

BD BioCoat™ cell culture inserts are pre-coated with extracellular matrix proteins for applications requiring protein-coated cell culture inserts, such as cell differentiation, migration and invasion assays. BD BioCoat cell culture inserts are packaged and ready-to-use in receiver plates. Culturing cells on microporous membranes has been shown to promote differentiation of a variety of epithelial and mesenchymal cells in vitro, especially in the presence of extracellular matrices. For example, cell culture inserts coated with fibrillar collagen I can establish barrier function of intestinal epithelial cell monolayers (Caco-2). Inserts coated with BD Matrigel matrix are frequently cited for in vitro cell invasion assays.

Eliminate cell scraping and manual cell counting with fluorescence blocking membranes

BD FluoroBlok™ cell culture inserts are designed with a light-tight PET membrane that efficiently blocks the transmission of light within the range of 490-700nm, allowing fluorescence detection in a simplified and non-destructive manner. Fluorescently labeled cells present in the top chamber of the insert are shielded from bottom-reading fluorescence plate readers and microscopes by the BD FluoroBlok membrane. Once labeled cells migrate through the membrane, they are easily detected by a bottom-reading fluroescence plate reader thereby eliminating cell scraping and manual cell counting. This non-destructive detection method enables both kinetic and endpoint migration and invasion assays.

Choose pore size and product by application

ApplicationPore Size (um)
0.4
1
3
8
Transport and Permeability
Drug transport across epithelial cell monolayer (ie. Caco-2)
BD Gentest™ pre-coated PAMPA plate system*
BD BioCoat™ intestinal epithelium differentiation environment*
BD BioCoat HTS Caco-2 Assay System*
X
X
 
 
Co-culture and Cell Monolayer
Cell-cell paracine interactions
Human endothelial monolayer permeability
Marine phytoplankers
X
X
X
 
In Vitro Model Systems
Human epidermal model
Human urothelium model
X
 
 
 
Cell Migration
Primary Blood Mononuclear Cells (PBMCs)
Neutrophils		 
 
X
X
Cell Invasion
BD BioCoat Matrigel invasion chamber*
BD BioCoat tumor invasion system (BD FluoroBlok based assay)*		 
 
X
X
Endothelial Cell Migration and Invasion
BD BioCoat angiogenisis system: endothelial cell migration
(BD FluoroBlok based assay)*
BD BioCoat angiogenisis system: endothelial cell invasion
(BD FluoroBlok based assay)*		 
 
X
 
*Denotes off-the-shelf, optimized system.
Note: This is not an exhaustive list of all cell types and applications. The appropriate pore size is cell type and application specific.
Use BD FluoroBlok multiwell inserts for high-throughput cell migration and invasion assays. For kinetic assays, use BD FluoroBlok individual and multiwell formats.