Cell engineering and advanced analytics for the immunotherapy of cancer and other health applications
The BC Cancer Immunotherapy Program’s Conconi Family Immunotherapy Lab (CFIL) manufactures clinical-grade engineered cell products for the treatment of cancer in the clinical trial setting. For example, we are currently manufacturing Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T cells for an academic phase I/II clinical trial for leukemia and lymphoma patients. We also provide Mycoplasma testing for T-Cell therapy products on a fee-for-service basis.
Our target discovery and vector development capabilities enable the identification of new target antigens for T-cell therapy, development of novel strategies and tools for T cell engineering, and assessment of these strategies in animal models to generate the necessary preliminary data for future clinical trials.
Our Molecular and Cellular Immunology Core (MCIC) is a full service facility specializing in advanced molecular, genomic and histological methods including multicolour immunohistochemistry and immunofluorescence, automated image analysis, laser capture microdissection, multispectral flow cytometry, and single-cell sequencing.
Our group supports academic and industry projects both nationally and internationally, ranging from investigator-driven basic research, to correlative studies for clinical trials, to fee-for-service projects with industrial clients.
- Healthcare and social services
- Life sciences, pharmaceuticals and medical equipment
- Manufacturing and processing
- Professional and technical services (including legal services, architecture, engineering)
Specialized labs and equipment
| Specialized lab | Equipment | Function |
|---|---|---|
| CFIL | Panasonic Cell Processing Work Stations (CPWS) (2) | Integrated isolators used for clinical-grade manufacturing of cell products. Each CPWS unit is comprised of a Grade A positive pressure workspace, multiple dockable CO2 incubators, high capacity centrifuge and digital microscope, all housed within a single isolator with an integrated non-viable particle counting and vaporized H2O2 sanitizing capability. |
| CFIL-Clean Room | CliniMACS Prodigy instruments (4) | Closed devices for clinical-grade manufacturing of CAR-T cells and other cell products |
| CFIL-Clean Room | Negative pressure compounding aseptic containment isolator | For manipulation of lentivirus stock solutions under BSL-2+ containment |
| CFIL-Clean Room | Fresenius Kabi Lovo | For cell harvesting/washing within a closed tubing set |
| CFIL-Clean Room | Terumo TSCD-II Sterile Tubing Welder (2) | Sterile welding devices |
| CFIL-Clean Room | bioMérieux BacT/Alert 3D Microbial Identification System | Sterility monitoring instrument |
| CFIL- QC Lab | Endosafe nexgen-PTS | Handheld spectrophotometer for endotoxin testing |
| CFIL | Beckman Coulter CytoFLEX Flow Cytometer | 3 laser/9 colour flow cytometer |
| CFIL | Luminex FLEXMAP 3D System | HLA (human leukocyte antigen) typing platform |
| MCIC | Leica LMD7 Laser Microdissection Microscope | Microscopic isolation of samples of interest as large as thick tissue volumes or as small as single living cells |
| MCIC | Thermo Scientific Microm HM355S Automatic Microtome | Automated microtome |
| MCIC | PerkinElmer Vectra Polaris Imaging System | Automated quantitative pathology imaging system |
| MCIC | Leica Aperio VERSA Brightfield, Fluorescence and FISH Digital Pathology Scanner | IHC, ISH and fluorescent tissue-based scanning including multiplex whole slide scanning |
| MCIC | 10X Genomics Chromium Controller | Single cell library construction for genome sequencing |
| MCIC | Cytek Aurora Cytometers (2) | Spectral flow cytometer |
Private and public sector research partners
- BC Cancer Foundation
- BCRegMed
- BioCanRx
- CancerCare Manitoba
- National Research Council Canada
- The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute (OHRI)
- Simon Fraser University
- Terry Fox Research Institute
- The University of British Columbia
- The University Health Network (UHN)
Additional information
| Title | URL |
|---|---|
| BC Cancer Research Molecular and Cellular Immunology Core (MCIC) | https://www.bccrc.ca/dept/drc/dept/drc/services/molecular-and-cellular-immunology-core |
| BC Cancer Immunotherapy Program | https://www.bccrc.ca/programs/bc-cancer-immunotherapy-program |
| BioCanRx Core and Biomanufacturing Facilities | https://biocanrx.com/research/core-facilities |