Chicken Chorioallantoic Membrane
(CAM) Assay

During the chicken embryo development, the CAM is formed by fusion of the mesodermal layer of the allantois with the mesodermal layer of the chorion. It is a highly vascularized, non-innervated extra embryonic membrane making it an ideal substrate for the study of angiogenesis and tumor growth.

A fertilized chicken egg is incubated for four to seven days when a window is created in the shell to observe the forming embryo and blood vessels. For the angiogenesis assay, various biomolecules and drugs can be topically delivered and studied for their angiogenic potency. For cancer models, various types of cells can be transplanted into the CAM for tumor growth. This provides a relatively simple model for studying many different cancer tumor formations and allows for testing new therapy drugs and personalized treatment strategies.

The CAM model is highly reproducible, cost effective, and does not require approval from an ethics board like many other in vivo animal models. Additionally, the CAM model has a natural immunodeficiency making it ideal for cell transplantation and the closed system prolongs the half-life of many experimental molecules, reducing the amount needed in studies.

Real time imaging

Perimed was the first company to commercialize laser-based microcirculation imaging and has over the past 40 years been the world leader in perfecting those techniques.

The PeriCam PSI Laser Speckle Contrast Imaging System can be used to measure the change in blood perfusion in the angiogenesis assay and detect differences in the efficacy of various pro-angiogenic compounds. It can also be used to monitor the formation of functional intratumoral blood vessels and assess the effectiveness of anti-angiogenic agents for cancer treatment.

PeriCam PSI can measure up to ~100 images per second. This makes it possible to see fast dynamic changes, such as pulsations caused by heart rate, at high image quality.