Microdroplet chain array for cell migration assays

Abstract

Establishing cell migration assays in multiple different microenvironments is important in the study of tissue repair and regeneration, cancer progression, atherosclerosis, and arthritis. In this work, we developed a miniaturized and massive parallel microfluidic platform for multiple cell migration assays combining the traditional membrane-based cell migration technique and the droplet-based microfluidic technique. Nanoliter-scale droplets are flexibly assembled as building blocks based on a porous membrane to form microdroplet chains with diverse configurations for different assay modes. Multiple operations including in-droplet 2D/3D cell culture, cell co-culture and cell migration induced by a chemoattractant concentration gradient in droplet chains could be flexibly performed with reagent consumption in the nanoliter range for each assay and an assay scale-up to 81 assays in parallel in one microchip. We have applied the present platform to multiple modes of cell migration assays including the accurate cell migration assay, competitive cell migration assay, biomimetic chemotaxis assay, and multifactor cell migration assay based on the organ-on-a-chip concept, for demonstrating its versatility, applicability, and potential in cell migration-related research.

Extracellular nanovesicles‐transmitted circular RNA has_circ_0000190 suppresses osteosarcoma progression

“…Based on the methods mentioned above, Transwell invasion and migration assays were carried out for analysis. 21…”

Emerging Trends in Microfluidics Based Devices

“…[ 72–76 ] In addition, these platforms have been used to investigate the migration of cancer cells in a multi‐organ cell environment. [ 77 ] BOC systems have shown great potential in studying organ physiology, tissue development, and disease etiology. However, the major obstacle for BOC systems is the medium circulation that helps in the transfer of nutrients and signaling factors exchange.…”

Flat and microstructured polymeric membranes in organs-on-chips

“…These proteins contain amino acid sequences like arginine-glycine-aspartic acid (RGD), which are potent sites for cell adhesion [54,55]. Cells interact with these sites via integrins, transmembrane proteins [6] erythrocyte oxygenation [7] gut [1,18,19] heart [40] kidney [13] liver [1,3,13,38] lung [1,11,13,42] multi-organ-on-chip (MOC) of liver and heart [47] new membranes for OOCs [52] poly(carbonate) (PC) blood -brain barrier (BBB) [4,43,44] bonding of membrane to chip [51] colon and breast cancer [27] gut [8,9] gut, liver and brain cancer [16] MOC of liver and intestine [29] MOC of liver and skin [29] multiple-layered cultures of fibroblasts, endothelial and mesenchymal cells [41] liver, lung and breast cancer and gut [25] skin [5,23] poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) gut [39] heart [28] kidney [15] liver [17,48] microfluidic barrier tissues [2] MOC of liver and cancer [21] white adipose tissue (fat) [26] aliphatic polyesters poly(lactic acid) (PLA) endothelial barrier [33] poly ( liver…”

“…PC (table 1) is widely used in OOCs (tables 1 and 3) [4,8,9,16,23,27,29,41,43,44,51]. It is also one of the most commonly used polymers for porous filter membranes and the porous membranes in Transwell w inserts.…”

“…It is also one of the most commonly used polymers for porous filter membranes and the porous membranes in Transwell w inserts. In fact, several OOCs implemented PC filter membranes [4,16,23,25,27,41,43,44,51] or PC membranes taken from Transwell w inserts [29,43]. PC is hydrophobic, transparent, inert and non-biodegradable.…”