Breaking Bottlenecks in Antibody Discovery
From research tools to FDA-approved therapeutics, antibodies have transformed science and medicine. Yet, the journey from immunization to a validated antibody remains slow and resource-intensive.
- Hybridoma screening is laborious and prone to genetic drift.
- B-cell sequencing is costly and lacks early functional insights.
- Recombinant antibody generation depends on producing stable, high-titer monoclonal lines.
These approaches often require extensive downstream assays to find functional antibodies—consuming time and resources on non-productive cells.
CellRaft Technology: Smarter Antibody Discovery
CellRaft Technology turns the traditional screening funnel upside down. Instead of screening blindly, it enables you to:
- Detect antibody secretion and specificity directly on-array
- Screen tens of thousands of individual cells in one compact consumable
- Isolate only the clones that matter— saving time and resources downstream
Using in-raft assays with flexible fluorescent readouts, researchers can detect generic IgG and antigen-specific antibodies in the same microwell, at the single-cell level.
Applications Across the Antibody Discovery Pipeline
Recover lost productivity from poor producing or unstable clones. In a collaboration with Tetracore, the CellRaft AIR® was used to recover high-producing clones from a population where only 0.1% of cells were still antibody producing. All recovered clones produced >10x more antibody than the parental line and restored functionality to a discontinued commercial kit.
Key Benefits:
- Detect rare antibody producers (<0.1% of population)
- Avoid drifted clones
- Validate secretion before expansion
Hybridoma Screening Workflow
Skip the sequencing-first approach. Use CellRaft AIR to identify and isolate antigen-specific B cells upfront.
In partnership with Duke University, Cell Microsystems screened 250,000 primary mouse plasma cells to identify antigen-specific target sequences. Recombinant antibodies produced from these sequences yielded specificity equivalent to commercial antibodies.
Key Benefits:
- Screen tens of thousands of rare, non-dividing plasma cells
- Identify antigen-specific sequences before investing in expression vectors
- Reduce sequencing costs by enriching for functional hits first
Single B-Cell Screening Workflow
When expression doesn’t guarantee function, use CellRaft Air to find your best producers early. Even in stably transduced, flow cytometry enriched cells, only a fraction actually secrete antibodies suitable for scale.
Key Benefits:
- Evaluate productivity of polyclonal populations and derive monoclonal production cell lines
- Select top performers based on secretion, not just transfection markers
- Avoid expanding non-functional clones
Recombinant Antibody Producer Selection Workflow
How It Works
Miniaturized ELISA
Detect antibody secretion in situ with fluorescent capture reagents.
Image-based Cytometry
Use CellRaft Cytometry software to identify viable antigen-specific cells.
Fluidics-Free Isolation
Recover cells on biocompatible rafts for direct expansion or sequencing.
96-Well Compatibility
Seamlessly integrate into ELISA, sequencing, and production workflows.
Advantages at a Glance
Ensuring cells undergoing gene editing grow into clonal colonies is an essential component of the editing workflow. Using the CellRaft AIR® system, single cells can be imaged and tracked over the course of colony formation. In addition, the knockout phenotypes (elimination of GFP and RFP signal) can be tracked over time which provides a unique capability for phenotypic gene editing screening.
Feature | Traditional Methods | CellRaft AIR System |
|---|---|---|
Throughput | 1,000 cells per 10 plates | 40,000 cells per array |
Function-first screening | ❌ | ✅ |
Clonal tracking | ❌ | ✅ |
Media usage | ~4,000 mL for 10 plates | ~3 mL per array |
Hands-on time | Dozens of hours | ~21 hours total per campaign |
Scale flexibility | Limited | Scalable from 1 to 10+ arrays |
Want to Start Faster? We'll Do It for You.
Our applications team offers lab services to help you:
- Rescue clones
- Screen hybridomas or plasma cells
- Develop custom antibody-expressing lines
When you’re ready, we’ll help you bring the workflow in-house with full training and support.