Description IBiSA is located on the Institute Paoli Calmettes campus in Marseille. The facility is opened to the medical and scientific community within the framework of projects related to cancerology and immunology. It is labelled IBiSA since 2008 and certified ISO 9001:2015 and NFX 50-900:2016 (specific to life science technology facilities). With its surface area of 250 m2, the facility includes different equipements/tools to develop research projects on the basis of fundamental immunology, cellular, and molecular biology. The facility notably designs, performs, and interprets the molecular and cellular tests that quantify and qualify the many facets of the immune response and in turn reduce the uncertainties about the development of these agents. Data from these tests also permit to explore of new directions that complement to the study of archived material from the tumor bank. Also, the facility team has a good expertise in tumor immunology (NK cells functions in hematological malignancies, breast cancer and congenital immunodeficiency, cells in AML and NHL, pDC), in signaling, (co-signaling molecules in hematological malignancies and solid tumors) and also in the analysis of tumor microenvironment. The equipments/tools include the following: -3 culture rooms (2 L1 and 1 L2) with laminar flow cabinets, optical microscopes, centrifuges for peripheral blood mononuclear cells isolation, incubators for any type of cell culture (cells isolated from patients including HIV, HBV and HCV infected patients or healthy donors and cell lines), -1 mass cytometer (Helios, Fluidigm, USA, acquired in 2018). Mass cytometry is a variation of conventional flow cytometry using metal tagged antibodies instead of fluorochromes and detection by time of flight of discrete masses of the metal tags. The high purity and choice of metal isotopes provide minimal background noise from signal overlap or endogenous cellular components. It can actually detect up to 37/40 parameters simultaneously in a single tube, accelerating biomarker discovery and drug screening, -1 FacsCanto II BD flow cytometer for analysis (3 lasers 405nm/488nm/633nm – 8 PMT) fitted with a tube conveying system (acquired in 2010, IBiSA, FEDER), -3 stations for data analysis (softwares: Diva, FlowJo, Kaluza), -1 station for high dimensional analysis ( tSNE, FlowSOM), -1 CTL immunospot 5 UV core analyser that supports both visible light assays (ELISpot) and fluorescence-based FluoroSpot assays. This technique is more sensitive than ELISA and let the detection of a single secreting cell (cytokine, antibody) among 1,000,000 cells, -1 Agilent Bioanalyser 2100 (acquired in 2007) to qualify (no DNA contamination, RNA integrity) and to quantify RNA samples before NGS or RQ-PCR. Platform specificities. The facility members closely collaborate with clinical departments and the Biobank of IPC, with the AP-HM, and has actually contracts with industrial partners (Cellectis, Innate Pharma, GlaxoSmithKline, Alderaan , Imcheck Therapeutics) as well as grants from academic institutions (ANRS, INCa, PACA region, DGOS) and research institutes (Calym, Pioneer). The team is headed by Daniel Olive (PU/PH) and include 2 project leaders (MCU/PH), 1 Lab manager, 1 post-doctoral fellow, 5 engineers, and 3 technicians.

Partner institution Aix-Marseille Université

Scientific domain LS6_4 - Immune-related diseases - Immunity, Infection and Immunotherapy LS6_11 - Innovative immunological tools and approaches, including therapi - Immunity, Infection and Immunotherapy

Keywords Biomarkers Cancer Biotherapies Innate immunity Adaptive immunity Monoclonal antibodies Immunodeficiency Malignant hemopathies Solid tumors Preclinical study Phase I and Phase II Protocol Microenvironment Flow cytometry Mass cytometry Phenotyping Identification of new targets