Here’s some interesting science you probably didn’t know (plus the Media City Scientific origin story):
15 years ago, the first journal club I ever delivered looked at the effects of culturing cells in serum derived from different animals. 🐁 Mouse cells cultured in human serum had a human-centric immune response. 👩🔬 Human cells cultured in mouse serum had a mouse-centric immune response. …And isn’t it interesting to consider these results in light of the fact that (all types of) cells are most commonly cultured in serum from fetal cows? 🐮 These findings lived rent-free in my mind until 2024 when I decided to do something about it. Like many scientists, I’ve cultured a lot of cells in FBS because “it works” and “that’s how everyone does it.” Like many scientists, I could also list the reasons why FBS is far from ideal scientifically and ethically. So, I started by optimising a chemically defined supplement for the most nutritionally demanding primary cells I had worked with, then expanded to other primary cell types and immortalised cells. One year later, we’ve started shipping an alternative to FBS that supports the growth of a broad range of cells. I’m a scientist, so I’m naturally skeptical, but I’ve collected enough data to feel pretty stoked about the direction of 2025. It’s also been about a year of being public on the internet about the company journey - mostly musings on cool science and startups, sharing learnings from founding a boot-strapped biotech as well as my previous four years with a hypergrowth, VC-backed startup. I’ve met so many scientists and engineers from around the world, and you've made this whole journey extra rewarding. Who knows? Maybe you’ll also find your life circling back to the very first journal club you ever delivered. ______ Much more science can be found in the paper by Warren et al: Resilience to bacterial infection: difference between species could be due to proteins in serum. It’s open access! 🥳 Graph shows how mouse cells differ in TNF production following challenge by 20ng/mL of LPS, when cultured in different types of serum. It also shows an inverse relationship between the lethal sensitivity of each species to LPS and TNF production by mouse cells cultured in each species' serum. The good news for this particular research model? Calf serum aligns with human serum more closely than many other species. Is this always the case? Time will tell....
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I came across this article from a few years ago and thought it was rather interesting and concerning1/9/2025 The article outlines how a group illegally smuggled 13,000 L of FBS from South America into Australia, posing a significant biosecurity risk. The smuggled FBS was used by the CSIRO in its cattle research and had the potential to introduce foot and mouth disease into Australian herds.
Events such as these underscore the value in replacing FBS with a broad spectrum chemically defined replacement. Bovine blood products illegally smuggled into Australia in international conspiracy - ABC News |
What's been happening?Sharing the Media City journey is important to us because we want to encourage the next generation of scientists to establish companies that will advance scientific research. Check back regularly for the "building in public" updates on what it looks like to establish a scientific company. Archives
January 2025
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