A low cost PS based microfluidic platform to investigate cell cycle towards developing a therapeutic strategy for cancer.

Inhibition of DNA damage response pathway in combination with DNA alkylating agents may enhance the selective killing of cancer cells leading to better therapeutic effects. MDM2 binding protein (MTBP) in human has a role in G1 phase (interphase of cell cycle) and its overexpression leads to breast and ovarian cancers. Sld7 is an uncharacterized protein in budding yeast and a potential functional homologue of MTBP. To investigate the role of Sld7 as a therapeutic target, the behavior of the wild-type cells and sld7∆ mutants were monitored in 0.5 nL microbioreactors. The brightfield microscopy images were used to analyze the change in the cell size and to determine the durations of G1 and S/G2/M phases of wild type cells and mutants. With the administration of the alkylating agent, the cell size decreased and the duration of cell cycle increased. The replacement of the medium with the fresh one enabled the cells to repair their DNA. The application of calorie restriction together with DNA alkylating agent to mutant cells resulted in smaller cell size and longer G1 phase compared to those in control environment. For therapeutic purposes, the potential of MTBP in humans or Sld7 in yeast as a drug target deserves further exploration. The fabrication simplicity, robustness and low-cost of this microfluidic bioreactor made of polystyrene allowed us to perform yeast culturing experiments and show a potential for further cell culturing studies. The device can successfully be used for therapeutic applications including the discovery of new anti-microbial, anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer drugs.