JoVE Logo

Sign In

A subscription to JoVE is required to view this content. Sign in or start your free trial.

Abstract

Bioengineering

Generation of Dynamical Environmental Conditions using a High-Throughput Microfluidic Device

Published: April 17th, 2021

DOI:

10.3791/61735

1State Key Laboratory of Cultivation Base for Photoelectric Technology and Functional Materials, State Key Laboratory of Photon-Technology in Western China Energy, Institute of Photonics and Photon-Technology, Northwest University

* These authors contributed equally

Abstract

Mimicking in vivo environmental conditions is crucial for in vitro studies on complex life machinery. However, current techniques targeting live cells and organs are either highly expensive, like robotics, or lack nanoliter volume and millisecond time accuracy in liquid manipulation. We herein present the design and fabrication of a microfluidic system, which consists of 1,500 culture units, an array of enhanced peristaltic pumps and an on-site mixing modulus. To demonstrate the capacities of the microfluidic device, neural stem cell (NSC) spheres are maintained in the proposed system. We observed that when the NSC sphere is exposed to CXCL in day 1 and EGF in day 2, the round-shaped conformation is well maintained. Variation in the input order of 6 drugs causes morphological changes to the NSC sphere and the expression level representative marker for NSC stemness (i.e., Hes5 and Dcx). These results indicate that dynamic and complex environmental conditions have great effects on NSC differentiation and self-renewal, and the proposed microfluidic device is a suitable platform for high throughput studies on the complex life machinery.

Explore More Videos

Keywords Microfluidic Device

This article has been published

Video Coming Soon

JoVE Logo

Privacy

Terms of Use

Policies

Research

Education

ABOUT JoVE

Copyright © 2024 MyJoVE Corporation. All rights reserved