Development of Cell-Carrying Magnetic Microrobots with Bioactive Nanostructured Titanate Surface for Enhanced Cell Adhesion.

Junyang Li,Lei Fan,Feng Li,Yanfang Li,Hua Tian,Cheng Wang,Dong Sun,Tanyong Wei

doi:10.3390/mi12121572

Abstract

Cell-carrying magnet-driven microrobots are easily affected by blood flow or body fluids during transportation in the body, and thus cells often fall off from the microrobots. To reduce the loss of loaded cells, we developed a microrobot with a bioactive nanostructured titanate surface (NTS), which enhances cell adhesion. The microrobot was fabricated using 3D laser lithography and coated with nickel for magnetic actuation. Then, the microrobot was coated with titanium for the external generation of an NTS through reactions in NaOH solution. Enhanced cell adhesion may be attributed to the changes in the surface wettability of the microrobot and in the morphology of the loaded cells. An experiment was performed on a microfluidic chip for the simulation of blood flow environment, and result revealed that the cells adhered closely to the microrobot with NTS and were not obviously affected by flow. The cell viability and protein absorption test and alkaline phosphatase activity assay indicated that NTS can provide a regulatory means for improving cell proliferation and early osteogenic differentiation. This research provided a novel microrobotic platform that can positively influence the behaviour of cells loaded on microrobots through surface nanotopography, thereby opening up a new route for microrobot cell delivery.

Highlights

Introduction iationsCell-based therapy has been widely used to treat various diseases, such as brain disorder [1], knee cartilage degeneration [2], central nervous system disorders [3] and cancer [4]
This paper reported the successful design and fabrication of a magnetic microrobot with an nanostructured titanate surface (NTS) for enhanced cell adhesion
The 3D laser lithography was used in fabricating the skeletons of the microrobots

Summary

Introduction

Introduction iationsCell-based therapy has been widely used to treat various diseases, such as brain disorder [1], knee cartilage degeneration [2], central nervous system disorders [3] and cancer [4]. Therapeutic cells are injected directly [5,6,7,8] or encapsulated with biocompatible polymers prior to administration to targeted damage sites [9,10,11,12]. These methods lack precise targeting ability and may cause the opening of wounds. Cell delivery using magnetic microrobots with different microgeometries has been reported in vitro and in vivo [22,23,24]. Magnetic porous cuboid and cylindrical microrobots were designed to transport human embryonic kidney (293 cells)

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Conclusion