Wadhawan N., Kalkat H., Ma X., Gajjeraman S., Nandagopal S., Hao N., Deng J., Xiang B., Zhang M., Tian G., Lin F.
University of Manitoba, CA
Keywords: adipose derived stem cells, microfluidic device
Microfluidic devices provide powerful new tools for quantitative stem cell research owing to its advantages in cellular microenvironmental control and experiment throughput over conventional methods. Particularly, microfluidics is playing a growing role in studying stem cell growth, differentiation and trafficking mediated by chemical factors such as different growth and differentiation factors and physical parameters such as direct current electric fields (dcEF). In the present study, we focused on adipose-derived stem cells (ADSCs) and we quantitatively characterized ADSCs growth and positioning mediated by epidermal growth factor (EGF) and dcEF using microfluidic devices. Our results revealed that ADSCs preferentially grow toward the EGF gradient. In addition, we showed that ADSCs tend to orient perpendicularly to the dcEF. These microfluidics-based results demonstrated the interesting roles of EGF and dcEF in controlling ADSCs growth and trafficking.
Journal: TechConnect Briefs
Volume: 2, Nanotechnology 2012: Electronics, Devices, Fabrication, MEMS, Fluidics and Computational (Volume 2)
Published: June 18, 2012
Pages: 306 - 309
Industry sectors: Advanced Materials & Manufacturing | Sensors, MEMS, Electronics
Topic: Micro & Bio Fluidics, Lab-on-Chip
ISBN: 978-1-4665-6275-2