Scientists at the Fraunhofer Institute for Toxicology and Experimental Medicine have established a novel procedure using chip cytometry for characterising immune cells in the lungs. This new technique offers a major advantage of enabling valuable samples from patients to be stored in refrigerators for months and investigated for further parameters if new issues become relevant during the course of a trial. The researchers said that patient samples would be applied onto a special slide—in this case, a chip with a transparent chamber – in the course of the study. This system not only allows them to differentiate the cell types from each other, but also to see whether they are activated and what subgroup they belong to.