Lipid‐gel and poly(dimethylsiloxane) film to mimic bioaccumulation in adipocytes

Abstract

Bioaccumulation is an increasingly important consideration in validation studies of the safety and efficacy of potential drugs. Although an "adipocyte" cell line model has been proven successful to mimic the accumulation of naphthalene in adipocytes, the prolonged incubation time limits its use in high-throughput studies and reduces reproducibility. In this investigation, naphthalene and naphthol accumulation and uptake kinetics of thin poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) film and lipid nanospheres suspended in a crosslinked gelatin gel (lipid-gel) were compared with those of adipocytes. Unlike the PDMS film, the lipid-gel can mimic the kinetics and extent of naphthalene accumulation in the adipocytes reasonably well. However, the lipid-gel accumulated about twice as much naphthol as the adipocytes, suggesting that hydrophobicity/hydrophilicity of the metabolite may be an important factor in the accuracy of accumulation studies with the lipid-gel. Nonetheless, the lipid-gel system shows promise as an inexpensive, convenient, and reproducible fat mimic for bioaccumulation studies.

Quantification of chemical–polymer surface interactions in microfluidic cell culture devices

“…Our group has developed microscale cell culture analog (microCCA), also called “Body‐on‐a‐Chip” devices, to evaluate the efficacy and toxicity of potential pharmaceuticals and environmental chemicals 4, 5, 21. A microCCA device is a simplified and minimized model of the human body, using mammalian cell cultures to represent key functions of specific organs.…”