Park Sinwook, Capelin Daniel, Piriatinskiy Gadi, Lotan Tamar, Yossifon Gilad
Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Micro- and Nanofluidics Laboratory, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Technion City, Israel.
Marine Biology Department, The Leon H. Charney School of Marine Sciences, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel.
Electrophoresis. 2017 Aug;38(16):1996-2003. doi: 10.1002/elps.201700072. Epub 2017 Jul 10.
Jellyfish stinging capsules known as nematocysts are explosive, natural-injection systems with high potential as a natural drug-delivery system. These organelles consist of a capsule containing a highly folded thin needle-like tubule and a matrix highly concentrated with charged constituents that enable the tubule to fire and penetrate a target. For the purpose of using these nematocysts as drug delivery system it is first required to purify subpopulations from heterogeneous population of capsules and to investigate each subpopulation's distinct function and characteristics. Here, the nematocysts' dielectric properties were experimentally investigated using dielectrophoretic and electrorotational spectra with best fits derived from theoretical models. The dielectric characterization adds to our understanding of the nematocysts' structure and function and is necessary for the dielectrophoretic isolation and manipulation of populations. As expected, the effect of monovalent and divalent exchange cations resulted in higher inner conductivity for the NaCl treated capsules; this result stands in agreement with their relative higher osmotic pressure. In addition, an efficient dielectrophoretic isolation of different nematocyst subpopulations was demonstrated, paving the way to an understanding of nematocysts' functional diversity and the development of an efficient drug delivery platform.
被称为刺丝囊的水母刺蛰胶囊是一种具有高潜力的天然注射系统，可作为天然药物递送系统。这些细胞器由一个含有高度折叠的细针状小管的胶囊和一个高度浓缩有带电成分的基质组成，这些成分使小管能够发射并穿透目标。为了将这些刺丝囊用作药物递送系统，首先需要从异质的胶囊群体中纯化亚群，并研究每个亚群的独特功能和特性。在这里，使用介电电泳和旋转电场光谱对刺丝囊的介电特性进行了实验研究，并从理论模型中得出了最佳拟合。介电特性表征增进了我们对刺丝囊结构和功能的理解，并且对于介电电泳分离和操纵群体是必要的。正如预期的那样，单价和二价交换阳离子的作用导致经氯化钠处理的胶囊具有更高的内部电导率；这一结果与其相对较高的渗透压一致。此外，还展示了对不同刺丝囊亚群的高效介电电泳分离，为理解刺丝囊的功能多样性和开发高效药物递送平台铺平了道路。
