SATIE, ENS Cachan, Cachan, France.
Electrophoresis. 2012 Aug;33(16):2508-15. doi: 10.1002/elps.201200112.
In this study, we analyzed the electrofusion of two cells in a biochip that has been developed to perform the capture by dielectrophoresis and the electrofusion of pairs of cells. The good transparency of the microsystem allowed analyzing the details of the fusion events. By staining one of the cells, the mixing of the two cytosols could be observed during the electrofusion experiment. We show for the first time the rapidity of the mixing of the two cytosols: less than 5 s under our experimental conditions. By comparing these experimental results to a numerical simulation, we found that the rate of this phenomenon is compatible with a diffusion-only mechanism, showing that during the fusion, the two cell membranes in contact are affected by very rapid structural changes and do not limit the exchange of the cytosols between the two cells. A point of interest is the use of dielectric structures to concentrate the electric field and of positive dielectrophoresis to capture cells in the area where the electric field is more intense. This technique allows the increase of the cell-to-cell contact and limits cell cytosol leakages during the fusion process.
在这项研究中，我们分析了在一个微流控芯片中两个细胞的电融合，该芯片是为通过介电泳捕获和两个细胞的电融合而开发的。微系统的良好透光性允许分析融合事件的细节。通过对一个细胞进行染色，可以在电融合实验中观察到两个细胞质的混合。我们首次展示了两个细胞质混合的快速性：在我们的实验条件下不到 5 秒。通过将这些实验结果与数值模拟进行比较，我们发现这种现象的速率与仅扩散机制相兼容，表明在融合过程中，接触的两个细胞膜受到非常快速的结构变化的影响，并且不会限制两个细胞之间细胞质的交换。一个有趣的观点是使用介电结构来集中电场，以及使用正介电泳在电场更强的区域捕获细胞。该技术允许增加细胞间的接触，并限制融合过程中细胞细胞质的泄漏。
