Cell line authentication

Cell lines are used extensively as research models and drug discovery tools. However, both academic and industry cell lines are plagued by misidentification and contamination. It is estimated that 10-40% cell lines are mislabeled, intra-/inter-species mixed, or mycoplasma contaminated. The majority (52%) of researchers never perform authentication or other

species-related QC tests on cell lines used in their experiments.

Since Nature called for a global database of cell line STR (short tandem repeats) profiles, STR has become the leading assay for cell line authentication. However, STR method has several limitations:

1. cannot detect intraspecies contamination below 5-10% (low sensitivity)

2. cannot detect interspecies contamination (e.g., human-mouse mix)

3. cannot detect mycoplasma/viral contamination

4. low throughput and labor intensive

5. only a mono-function assay

Here, we provide an ultrasensitive multi-purpose NGS assay for cell line authentication.

Each cell line has a unique SNP fingerprint consisted of nucleotides and their frequencies in >200 SNP sites. This assay can

1. authenticate human cell lines with 100% accuracy (SNP based)

2. authenticate commonly used mouse cell lines with 100% accuracy

3. detect contamination at 1% sensitivity (STR: 5-10%)

4. detect mouse contamination in human cell lines at 0.1% sensitivity

5. detect mycoplasma contamination

6. detect common viral infection (EBV, HBV, HPV, etc.)

7. infer gender accurately for human samples

8. infer genetic composition of human samples

Assay validation:

Example 1:

Example 2:

Turnaround Time:

1-2 weeks after receiving sample DNA