Abstract
In this paper, we present a simple, versatile method that creates patterns for cell migration studies using thermoplastic elastomer (TPE). The TPE material used here can be robustly, but reversibly, bonded to a variety of plastic substrates, allowing patterning of cultured cells in a microenvironment. We first examine the bonding strength of TPE to glass and polystyrene substrates and com-pare it to thermoset silicone-based PDMS under various conditions and demonstrate that the TPE can be strongly and reversibly bonded on commercially available polystyrene culture plates. In cell migration studies, cell patterns are templated around TPE features cored from a thin TPE film. We show that the significance of fibroblast cell growth with fetal bovine serum (FBS)-cell culture media compared to the cells cultured without FBS, analyzed over two days of cell culture. This simple approach allows us to generate cell patterns without harsh manipulations like scratch assays and to avoid damaging the cells. We also confirm that the TPE material is non-toxic to cell growth and supports a high viability of fibroblasts and breast cancer cells. We anticipate this TPE-based patterning approach can be further utilized for many other cell patterning applications such as in cell-to-cell communication studies.
Highlights
Cell patterning provides a simple and low-cost method for cell migration studies.Many technologies have been developed to pattern cells within in vitro microenvironments to enable the study of cell migration including invasion into transwell inserts, Boyden chamber assays [1], scratch assays [2], ring barrier assays [3], and aqueous two-phase cell patterning [4]
The resulting data show that the delamination pressures of thermoplastic elastomer (TPE) on the glass slide and PS substrates are about 3.4 and 7 times higher than that of PDMS cases, respectively, without subjecting to any post heat treatment after being assembled at room temperature
When the assembled sample is thermally treated, the bonding strength of the TPE against both the glass slide surface and the PS surface is enhanced with increasing heat treatment temperature, while the bonding strength of PDMS remains relatively unchanged
Summary
Many technologies have been developed to pattern cells within in vitro microenvironments to enable the study of cell migration including invasion into transwell inserts, Boyden chamber assays [1], scratch assays [2], ring barrier assays [3], and aqueous two-phase cell patterning [4] These approaches use basic 2D cell culture platforms, they offer a wide variety of possible cell assay applications. The chipbased models enable formation of 3D architecture blood vessels and the study of soluble biochemistry in discrete fluidic channel networks [6], as well as the study of epithelialendothelial migration in breast cancer [7] These novel microfluidic approaches closely mimic both physiological and pathological microenvironments and there is a significant effort to apply these technologies to new drug screening and therapeutic applications. We show a wholly plastic-based approach to generate cell patterning without more complicated photolithography-based processes and demonstrate its capability for cell migration study
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