Hi everyone,

Welcome! If you are here I assume you too are a bone marrow enthusiast, with a fondness for haematopoietic cells and all things blood cell.

We've created this group off the back of the response to our Cancer Discovery paper (https://doi.org/10.1158/2159-8290.CD-22-0199) where we report the iPSC derived generation of bone marrow organoids. We're both overwhelmed and touched by the positive response from the community, and the number of groups who have expressed an interest in setting up the model in their own labs for future research.

In the hopes of facilitating that, the next step seems (to us at least) to set up a forum for discussion. Many of you have emailed/texted/visited, and we've shared protocols and other tips and tricks - but I suspect the best way to manage questions and facilitate this becoming a useful tool for everyone is to create a group where resource and expertise are shared.

To that end, we've put together this group and invited those of you with an interest in setting up the model here. As most of you will know, we have a manuscript under review at Nature Protocols. We will upload this and any other relevant material here in the coming weeks so there is a centralised resource for new users. I'm hopeful that this will include tips and tricks and minor improvements and optimisations that aren't paper worthy in and of themselves, but significant enough to help you in setting up the system in your labs.

Similarly, if you have any thoughts or ideas that you would like to share please feel free to do so. My hope is that this will be a useful forum for discussion.

With that spiel over - here are some general rules:

1. I hope it goes without saying that respect and courtesy are expected from all members. Zero tolerance policy for anything else.

2. Discretion - for now we will keep this as a closed group, so please respect that material shared here is shared in confidence and in the interest of facilitating work.

3. Please feel free to share data and thoughts BUT do not share material or protocols that may constitute a disclosure or breach (or other legal problem).

4. We will share some optimised protocols and adjustments that we implement, and hopefully respond to questions in a timely manner. Please respect that we can't share anything confidential, but will do so as soon as we can where it benefits the community. Also respect that we run this in parallel to all our normal duties, so please be patient if we don't reply or answer quickly!

With that - thanks for joining and good luck! We hope this proves to be a useful forum for everyone.

Best wishes,

The Oxford Organoid Team (TooT)

comBO co-cultures

Abdullah Khan