IBM Research GmbH, Säumerstrasse 4, 8803 Rüschlikon, Switzerland.
Curr Opin Pharmacol. 2013 Oct;13(5):821-8. doi: 10.1016/j.coph.2013.07.005. Epub 2013 Jul 19.
Understanding the mechanisms of cell-cell interaction is a key unanswered question in modern pharmacology, given crosstalk defects are at the basis of many pathologies. Microfluidics represents a valuable tool for analyzing intercellular communication mediated by transmission of soluble signals, as occurring for example between neurons and glial cells in neuroinflammation, or between tumor and surrounding cells in cancer. However, the use of microfluidics for studying cell behavior still encompasses many technical and biological challenges. In this review, a state of the art of successes, potentials and limitations of microfluidics applied to key biological questions in modern pharmacology is analyzed and commented.
了解细胞间相互作用的机制是现代药理学中一个未解决的关键问题，因为细胞间通讯的缺陷是许多病理学的基础。微流控技术是分析通过可溶性信号传递介导的细胞间通讯的有价值的工具，例如在神经炎症中神经元和神经胶质细胞之间，或在癌症中肿瘤细胞和周围细胞之间。然而，微流控技术在研究细胞行为方面仍然存在许多技术和生物学挑战。在这篇综述中，分析和评论了微流控技术在现代药理学中的关键生物学问题上的应用的成功、潜力和局限性的最新进展。
