128 / 155
Single-Cell Biophysics: Measurement, Modulation, and Modeling
Poster Abstracts
123
50-POS
Board 25
Cell Stretching Dish
Qingsen Li
, Stefano Marchesi, Gururaj Rao, Giorgio Scita, Marco Foiani.
IFOM, Milan, Milano, Italy.
Cells in the body constantly experience mechanical stimuli in various organ movement,
development and functions. These mechanical stimuli are often essential to proper cell function,
such as migration, proliferation, differentiation[1-4]. Cells sense such mechanical stimuli
through a process called mechanotransduction [1, 5, 6]. Abnormal mechanotransduction leads to
several patho-genesis, such as cancer, asthma, heart disease[1, 7, 8]. In Mechanobiology studies,
the advance of in vitro technologies for the application of physiologically mimicking mechanical
force to cultured cells and tissue are vital due to the complex in vivo biological system. The
growing interest in Mechanobiology and technology gap have motivated the development of cell
stretching device in various research labs and companies [10]. However, most cell stretching
systems are bulky and limited in functions. In particular, there is no cell culture chamber/dish
capable of multifunctional cell stretching. A novel cell stretching device in the size of a cell
culture petri dish has been invented, which is called cell stretching dish. It is capable of uniaxial
as well as biaxial stretching. The cell stretching dish is characterized by high level of stretching,
which can reach up to 100% (and more). It is portable and easy to be used for both cell culture
and microscope imaging experiment. The device has been tested to be compatible with the high
resolution objectives, for live cell as well as fixed cell immunofluorescence imaging, and can be
scaled up and down to fit any inverted microscope. The device can be 3D printed or made from
plastic, thus further reducing the cost of production, bringing down the complicated cell
stretching system to the consumable level. The unique design, high level stretch, cheap cost will
open variety of possibilities not only to researchers in mechanobiology but also broad field of
biologist.