Drug Discovery

PSI is developing tools to automate research, drug discovery and toxicology assays using zebrafish embryos and larvae. PSI has developed the SideView™ microplate, a 96-well plate that features rectangular wells that align samples with right angle prisms. This novel microplate enables collection of clear images of the sides of zebrafish larvae, and other organisms, in microwells using an inverted microscope (www.sideviewmicroplate.com). This technology is expected to accelerate vertebrate developmental biology research, and aid in drug discovery and toxicology testing. These efforts have been supported both internally and through the NIH.

A second, novel tool has been developed to accelerate discovery of new pharmaceuticals that affect cardiac output and also provides a moderate-throughput, early stage cardiac toxicology platform. That device uses Fourier Domain-Optical Doppler Tomography to generate 2-D and 3-D structural videos and extract blood velocity information. The atrium and ventricle are clearly visualized in structural videos thus enabling identification of heart rhythm defects. Blood velocity and cross-sectional area are measured at the aorta to provide robust cardiac output measurements. Transverse scans through the atrium and ventrical, and through the ventral aorta are depicted in the video below.