Abstract
The role of cell mechanics in cancer cells is a novel research area that has resulted in the identification of new mechanisms of therapy resistance. Single beam acoustic (SBA) tweezers are a promising technology for the quantification of the mechanical phenotype of cells. Our previous study showed that SBA tweezers can be used to quantify the deformability of adherent breast cancer cell lines. The physical properties of patient-derived (primary) pre-B acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) cells involved in chemotherapeutic resistance have not been widely investigated. Here, we demonstrate the feasibility of analyzing primary pre-B ALL cells from four cases using SBA tweezers. ALL cells showed increased deformability with increasing acoustic pressure of the SBA tweezers. Moreover, ALL cells that are resistant to chemotherapeutic drugs were more deformable than were untreated ALL cells. We demonstrated that SBA tweezers can quantify the deformability of nonadherent leukemia cells and discriminate this mechanical phenotype in chemotherapy-resistant leukemia cells in a contact- and label-free manner.
Highlights
Optical tweezers were developed by Ashkin in 197011
When leukemia cell viability is maintained under continuous drug treatment before increasing again after withdrawing the drugs from the cell culture system, these cells are defined as drug resistant. Using this model of drug-resistant acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) cells, we investigated the mechanical properties of four primary pre-B ALL cells after chemotherapeutic treatment based on single beam acoustic (SBA) tweezers and demonstrated that SBA tweezers can assess the deformability of ALL cells in suspension
We demonstrated that the acoustic trapping technology based on SBA tweezers is a promising tool in the quantification of the mechanical property of suspended cells
Summary
Optical tweezers were developed by Ashkin in 197011. Forces produced by the photons striking the cell along their propagation direction were found to be capable of exerting pressure on cells to produce a scattering force along the beam axis and a gradient force perpendicular to the beam axis[12]. J. Huang group and single beam acoustic (SBA) tweezers by the K. BAW and SAW have been used in studies of cells/particles in manipulation, aggregation and gene expression analysis[18,19], but they have not been used to evaluate the mechanical properties of cells since they require the use of one or more pairs of transducers[20]. The term “single beam” indicates that the tweezers are capable of manipulating a single cell or a particle with a single element transducer[21,22,23]. This technology was first theoretically and experimentally established by K. These findings suggest the possible role of increased deformability in the metastasis of cancer cells[1]
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