Albumin for Cell Culture – Selection Guide

What are Albumins?

Crucial proteins that bind, stabilize, and sequester other proteins and small molecules in cells, albumins are proteins that play a large role in cell culture applications such as:

• Preventing non-specific binding in immunoassays (including ELISA) and Western blotting
• As a stabilizer in enzymatic assays and in therapeutic development
• As a cell culture media supplement, providing cells with growth factors and other nutrients

The most commonly used albumins include bovine serum albumin (BSA), human serum albumin (HSA), and recombinant albumins, but can be sourced from chicken, mouse, porcine, and animal component free systems. Not all albumins have the same efficacy in culture media, so it is important to consider the purity and if the product is tested for cell culture applications. The variety of albumins makes it difficult to determine which protein is right for your application.

Here we present a selection guide for users to determine the ideal albumin for their cell culture application, as albumin selection can drastically affect experimental outcomes.