title: ICECAP: an integrated, general-purpose, automation-assisted IC50/EC50 assay platform.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  IC50 and EC50 values are commonly used to evaluate drug potency. Mass spectrometry (MS)-centric bioanalytical and biomarker labs are now conducting IC50/EC50 assays, which, if done manually, are tedious and error-prone. Existing bioanalytical sample preparation automation systems cannot meet IC50/EC50 assay throughput demand.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A general-purpose, automation-assisted IC50/EC50 assay platform was developed to automate the calculations of spiking solutions and the matrix solutions preparation scheme, the actual spiking and matrix solutions preparations, as well as the flexible sample extraction procedures after incubation. In addition, the platform also automates the data extraction, nonlinear regression curve fitting, computation of IC50/EC50 values, graphing, and reporting.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The automation-assisted IC50/EC50 assay platform can process the whole class of assays of varying assay conditions. In each run, the system can handle up to 32 compounds and up to 10 concentration levels per compound, and it greatly improves IC50/EC50 assay experimental productivity and data processing efficiency.
authors.affiliation: Biogen Idec, Inc., Cambridge, MA, USA ming.li@biogenidec.com.
authors.forename: Ming
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Biogen Idec, Inc., Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Judy
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Chou
authors.affiliation: Biogen Idec, Inc., Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Kristopher W
authors.initials: KW
authors.lastname: King
authors.affiliation: Biogen Idec, Inc., Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Jing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jing
authors.affiliation: Biogen Idec, Inc., Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Dong
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Wei
authors.affiliation: Biogen Idec, Inc., Cambridge, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Liyu
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Yang
mesh_terms: D057205:Automation, Laboratory / Q000379:methods*; D020128:Inhibitory Concentration 50; D010600:Pharmacology / Q000379:methods*
keywords: EC50; IC50; automation