Nanotechnologists at the University of Twente MESA+ have developed a microfluidic platform for experimentation on cell membranes and individual membrane proteins. This platform will find multiple applications in drug screening assays on membrane proteins, and for fundamental studies on both membrane proteins and cell membrane properties. The results of this work have been published as a cover article in the 8th April issue of the scientific journal Small.
Cellular membranes play an essential role in biological processes: they act as selective molecular barriers and they house membrane proteins that regulate the cell communication with its environment and transport across the membrane. Experimentation on cell membranes and membrane proteins is facilitated by using artificial and simplified models such as planar bilayer lipid membranes. However, in a standard experimentation approach, the membrane models are vertical, which precludes the use of optical techniques and limits the experiments to electrical measurements. Furthermore, the preparation of the membrane model is cumbersome, entirely manual and not always reproducible. Researchers at the University of Twente MESA+ Institute for Nanotechnology have developed a microfluidic platform for high-yield, reproducible and quasi-automated membrane formation. The platform consists of a sandwich structure where two glass substrates which house independent fluidic microchannels are separated by a Teflon foil. Membrane models are prepared across a 100-μm aperture in the Teflon layer, and the two channels acting as fluidic reservoirs represent the intra- and the extracellular environment. The horizontal configuration of the membrane in the device allows for combined electrical and optical microscopy measurements, and the platform is even compatible with confocal microscopy after minor adaptation. The potential of the platform is notably demonstrated for membrane formation using various phospholipids, followed by their characterization, phospholipid phase separation imaging using confocal microscopy, single pore-forming species measurements and indirect assessment of the alteration of membrane properties using a pore-forming species as a sensor.
Research
This work was carried out by Verena Stimberg, Johan Bomer, Iris van Uitert, Albert van den Berg and Séverine Le Gac from the BIOS Lab on a Chip Group at the University of Twente MESA+ Institute for Nanotechnology. This work is supported by NanoNextNL, a micro and nanotechnology consortium of the Government of the Netherlands and 130 partners.
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