Abstract
Although numerous strategies are now available to generate rudimentary forms of synthetic cell-like entities, minimal progress has been made in the sustained excitation of artificial protocells under non-equilibrium conditions. Here we demonstrate that the electric field energization of coacervate microdroplets comprising polylysine and short single strands of DNA generates membrane-free protocells with complex, dynamical behaviours. By confining the droplets within a microfluidic channel and applying a range of electric field strengths, we produce protocells that exhibit repetitive cycles of vacuolarization, dynamical fluctuations in size and shape, chaotic growth and fusion, spontaneous ejection and sequestration of matter, directional capture of solute molecules, and pulsed enhancement of enzyme cascade reactions. Our results highlight new opportunities for the study of non-equilibrium phenomena in synthetic protocells, provide a strategy for inducing complex behaviour in electrostatically assembled soft matter microsystems and illustrate how dynamical properties can be activated and sustained in microcompartmentalized media.
Highlights
Numerous strategies are available to generate rudimentary forms of synthetic cell-like entities, minimal progress has been made in the sustained excitation of artificial protocells under non-equilibrium conditions
We show that excitation of the protocells leads to a continuous exchange of matter with the environment via repetitive cycles of vacuole nucleation, growth and expulsion, spontaneous ejection and sequestration of microdomains of the coacervate matrix, directional capture of solute molecules, and pulsed enhancement of enzyme cascade reactions
FITC-labelled poly(L-lysine) Cy5-labelled ss-oligo ss-oligo are fluorescently labelled with fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) and 1,1-bis(3-hydroxypropyl)-3,3,3,3-tetramethylindodicarbocyanine (Cy5), respectively, to assist imaging of the droplets within the microfluidic channel
Summary
Numerous strategies are available to generate rudimentary forms of synthetic cell-like entities, minimal progress has been made in the sustained excitation of artificial protocells under non-equilibrium conditions. While modularized systems can be locally excited, for example, by light-driven pumping of protons across a targeted vesicle membrane to induce gene expression[23], energization at a non-local level requires the maintenance and coupling of chemical fuel gradients to internalized protometabolic processes, or alternatively, the indiscriminate excitation of the protocell medium by an externally applied field In this regard, protocell models based on coacervate liquid microdroplets are distinctive for their molecularly crowded, reduced dielectric constant aqueous interiors that consist of a highly enriched matrix of electrostatically interacting counter-charged polyelectrolytes[17,24]. Our results highlight new opportunities for the study of non-equilibrium phenomena in synthetic protocell research, provide a novel strategy for inducing complex behaviour in electrostatically assembled soft matter microsystems and illustrate how dynamical properties can be activated and sustained in microcompartmentalized media
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