Abstract
The impact of external medium conductivity on the efficiency of the reversible permeabilisation caused by pulsed electric fields was investigated. Pulses of 12 ns, 102 ns or 100 μs were investigated. Whenever permeabilisation could be detected after the delivery of one single pulse, media of lower conductivity induced more efficient reversible permeabilisation and thus independently of the medium composition. Effect of medium conductivity can however be hidden by some saturation effects, for example when pulses are cumulated (use of trains of 8 pulses) or when the detection method is not sensitive enough. This explains the contradicting results that can be found in the literature. The new data are complementary to those of one of our previous study in which an opposite effect of the conductivity was highlighted. It stresses that the conductivity of the medium influences the reversible permeabilization by several ways. Moreover, these results clearly indicate that electropermeabilisation does not linearly depend on the energy delivered to the cells.
Highlights
The impact of external medium conductivity on the efficiency of the reversible permeabilisation caused by pulsed electric fields was investigated
No cell death induced by the electric pulses alone, i.e. in the absence of bleomycin, was observed
In the presence of bleomycin, the fraction of cells that died corresponds to the fraction of cells reversibly permeabilized by the electric pulses
Summary
The impact of external medium conductivity on the efficiency of the reversible permeabilisation caused by pulsed electric fields was investigated. Effect of medium conductivity can be hidden by some saturation effects, for example when pulses are cumulated (use of trains of 8 pulses) or when the detection method is not sensitive enough This explains the contradicting results that can be found in the literature. The new data are complementary to those of one of our previous study in which an opposite effect of the conductivity was highlighted It stresses that the conductivity of the medium influences the reversible permeabilization by several ways. Micropulses and millipulses act on the membrane in a similar way is still an open question To help clarifying this issue, we focused on the influence of extra-cellular medium on permeabilisation by both microsecond and nanosecond pulses. The methods used to explore the www.nature.com/scientificreports/
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