Impact of fungal contamination in cell culture
Fungal
contamination may severely affect cell metabolism, growth and viability,
as well as decrease transfection efficiency, thereby affecting the
reproducibility of the results.
The main sources of fungal
contaminations are through airborne routes, non-sterile equipment and
reagents, or poor aseptic techniques. Fungi mostly grow in the medium in
suspension but can also become attached to cells or to the growth
vessel. They can be identified under the microscope as small isolated
colonies at the surface of the medium and by extended growth lead to
culture medium turbidity. At advanced stages of contamination, fungi
might increase the pH of the cell culture medium, resulting in
phenol-red containing media to appear to be lighter in tone.
Check
out Funox®, our antimycotic reagent specifically designed to work as a
prophylactic agent against fungal infection. It consists of Natamycin- a
polyene antifungal antibiotic produced by Streptomyces natalensis. The
antifungal activities of Natamycin are dependent on their binding to the
cell membrane sterols of various fungi.
Benefits
- Specificity
Funox®
is an additive for culture media, which contains Natamycin, a naturally
occurring antimicrobial agent that protects cell cultures from a broad
range of common fungi and yeast contaminants.
- Wide Range of Applications
Funox®
can be used for permanent cell cultures as well as for contamination
prevention in freshly prepared primary cell cultures.
- No Cell Toxicity
No
cytotoxic effects have been reported on various cell lines so far,
provided that the product is used according to the instructions.
- Easy-to-use
Funox®
can be added directly to any flask or plate of cell culture, preferably
while changing the medium or after passaging cells
- Stability
Funox® should be refreshed after 7 days of incubation at 37 °C to achieve maximum protection.
Recommended Use
Funox®
is applicable in research and industry for direct testing of cell
cultures and biologicals. Not recommended for clinical diagnostics.
It is recommended to use the product on two different concentrations:
- Cell culture media additive for prevention:
Add 1 ml of Funox® to a 500 ml batch of complete, ready-to-use cell
culture medium (1:500 dilution final concentration 10 μg/ml as a
prophylactic product into cell cultures) - Cell culture media treatment for elimination (at early stage of contamination):
a) Add 2.5 ml of Funox® to 500 ml of freshly prepared, complete cell culture medium.
b) Replace medium of the contaminated cell culture with the
Funox®–containing full medium by splitting or medium change (1:200
dilution, final concentration 25 µg/ml to eliminate existing fungal
contaminations)
We advise to discard the cell culture in case of advanced stage of contamination.
Content
The easily applicable 500x aqueous solution is sterile-filtered and ready-to-use.
Package Sizes
- Cat. No. 14-0020 20 ml
- Cat. No. 14-0060 3 x 20 ml
Shelf Life and Storage
Funox® must be stored at ≤ -18 °C (Shipped on cool packs). Funox® is light sensitive and must be protected from light.
If you cannot find the answer to your problem then please contact us or telephone +44 (0)1954 210 200