Department of Bioengineering, Rice University, Houston, TX 77030, USA and Department of Nanomedicine, Houston Methodist Research Institute, Houston, TX 77030, USA.
College of Engineering, Swansea University Singleton Park, Swansea, UK and Department of Nanomedicine, Houston Methodist Research Institute, Houston, TX 77030, USA.
Lab Chip. 2017 Mar 14;17(6):1009-1023. doi: 10.1039/c6lc01367h.
Cell-cell communication is a crucial component of many biological functions. For example, understanding how immune cells and cancer cells interact, both at the immunological synapse and through cytokine secretion, can help us understand and improve cancer immunotherapy. The study of how cells communicate and form synaptic connections is important in neuroscience, ophthalmology, and cancer research. But in order to increase our understanding of these cellular phenomena, better tools need to be developed that allow us to study cell-cell communication in a highly controlled manner. Some technical requirements for better communication studies include manipulating cells spatiotemporally, high resolution imaging, and integrating sensors. Microfluidics is a powerful platform that has the ability to address these requirements and other current limitations. In this review, we describe some new advances in microfluidic technologies that have provided researchers with novel methods to study intercellular communication. The advantages of microfluidics have allowed for new capabilities in both single cell-cell communication and population-based communication. This review highlights microfluidic communication devices categorized as "short distance", or primarily at the single cell level, and "long distance", which mostly encompasses population level studies. Future directions and translation/commercialization will also be discussed.
细胞间通讯是许多生物学功能的关键组成部分。例如，了解免疫细胞和癌细胞如何相互作用，包括在免疫突触和通过细胞因子分泌的相互作用，有助于我们理解和改善癌症免疫治疗。研究细胞如何通讯和形成突触连接对于神经科学、眼科学和癌症研究都很重要。但是，为了增加我们对这些细胞现象的理解，需要开发更好的工具，使我们能够以高度可控的方式研究细胞间通讯。更好的通讯研究的一些技术要求包括时空操纵细胞、高分辨率成像和集成传感器。微流控技术是一个强大的平台，具有满足这些要求和其他当前限制的能力。在这篇综述中，我们描述了微流控技术的一些新进展，这些进展为研究细胞间通讯提供了新的方法。微流控的优势允许在单细胞间通讯和基于群体的通讯方面都具有新的功能。这篇综述重点介绍了分类为“短距离”或主要在单细胞水平的微流控通讯设备，以及主要涵盖群体水平研究的“长距离”微流控通讯设备。还将讨论未来的方向和转化/商业化。
