In‐use evaluation of the omnicon automated tumor colony counter

Abstract

The reproducibility and accuracy of the Omnicon (Bausch and Lomb Inc., Rochester, NY) automated tumor colony counter for counting tumor colonies growing in double layer soft agar is evaluated and the reproducibility is compared with manual tumor colony counting. Replicate within day runto-run colony counts of the Omnicon show a median correlation coefficient (r) of >0.985, and day-to-day median r of >0.980. In contrast, for manual colony counting, the best intra-observer reproducibility achieved is a r of 0.943 and the best inter-observer reproducibility is a r of 0.831. Analysis of results from individual culture plates counted by the Omnicon on 5 separate days shows a median coefficient of variation of 10% with 77% of the culture dishes showing coefficients of variation of colony counts over 5 days of less than 20%. Counting of culture plates during incubation shows that the Omnicon is counting tumor colonies developing after plating of a single cell suspension.

Establishment and characterization of seven dunning rat prostatic cancer cell lines and their use in developing methods for predicting metastatic abilities of prostatic cancers

“…The dynamic growth of colonies cultured in vitro was detected and followed by counting two dishes twice a week over a period of 3-6 weeks [21]. All colony counting was performed using the Omnicon Fas TI automated colony counter (Milton Roy Inc., Analytical Product Division, Rochester, NY), as previously decribed [22].…”

Low‐cost, high‐throughput, automated counting of bacterial colonies

“…Automation of colony counting has been of increasing interest for many decades (1)(2)(3), and these methods have been shown to be more consistent than manual counting (1,4). Herman et al (5) demonstrated that automated colony counts had significantly less variation when reanalyzing plates than those manually determined by individual or multiple observers. Similarly, Lumley et al (6) attributed the significant disparity in colony forming unit granulocyte-macrophage assay results across laboratories to differences in colony counting.…”

Effect of alpha‐ and gamma‐Interferon and tumor necrosis factor on colony formation of two human renal tumor xenografts in vitro

“…For the detection of the growth potential of tumor cells in soft agar a modified two-layer soft agar culture method as originally described by Hamburger and Salmon [25] was used [26]. Growth potential was quantified using an Omnicon Fas I1 automated colony counter (Milton Roy, Rochester, NY, USA) [27].…”