Quantitative electrophysiological monitoring of anti–histamine drug effects on live cells via reusable sensor platforms

Abstract

We demonstrated the quantitative electrophysiological monitoring of histamine and anti–histamine drug effects on live cells via reusable sensor platforms based on carbon nanotube transistors. This method enabled us to monitor the real–time electrophysiological responses of a single HeLa cell to histamine with different concentrations. The measured electrophysiological responses were attributed to the activity of histamine type 1 receptors on a HeLa cell membrane by histamine. Furthermore, the effects of anti–histamine drugs such as cetirizine or chlorphenamine on the electrophysiological activities of HeLa cells were also evaluated quantitatively. Significantly, we utilized only a single device to monitor the responses of multiple HeLa cells to each drug, which allowed us to quantitatively analyze the antihistamine drug effects on live cells without errors from the device-to-device variation in device characteristics. Such quantitative evaluation capability of our method would promise versatile applications such as drug screening and nanoscale bio sensor researches.