HTavana Poster LabAuto2010
From LabAutopedia
Poster Title
High-Fidelity Non-Contact Cell and Reagent Printing onto Living Cells in Fully Aqueous Media to Study Cell Function
Author(s) name and affiliation
H. Tavana1, A. Jovic1, B. Mosadegh1, G.D. Luker2, S.J. Weiss3, S. Takayama1
Department of 1Biomedical Engineering, 2Microbiology and Immunology, 3Internal Medicine, University of Michigan
Poster Abstract
Direct cell-cell and cell-material interactions regulate cell fate and function in the body. The availability of micropatterning technologies has made it possible to create simple patterns of biological materials to study such processes in vitro. Nevertheless, existing techniques mainly rely on the physical contact of a patterning tool with a dry surface and thus, are limited for direct patterning onto living cells because dry conditions and physical contact are damaging to cells.
We describe a new technology that allows direct contact-free patterning of nanoliters of reagents and cells onto delicate surfaces of cells. We utilize a polymeric aqueous two-phase system (ATPS) with polyethylene glycol (PEG) and dextran (DEX) as the phase-forming polymers. Reagents of interest are mixed with the aqueous DEX phase and printed on an existing cell monolayer within the immersion PEG phase. We show broad utility of this strategy for (i) directing the fate of embryonic stem cells to neurons by printing them on support stromal cells and (ii) patterned delivery of genetic materials (DNA and shRNA) to cells for phenotypic screening of gene expression and knockdown.
The technology is straightforward to implement, economically sound requiring off-the-shelf equipment only, and conveniently accessible to researchers in academic and industrial settings.
