[Effect of trehalose-loading on red blood cell membrane]

This study was purposed to evaluate the effect of trehalose-loading on physiological and biochemistry properties of red blood cell (RBC) membrane. The samples were divided into the control group (RBC without trehalose loading) and the test group (RBC with trehalose loading). Osmotic fragility reaction was used to determine the osmotic fragility change of loaded RBC membrane in NaCl solution of different osmotic concentration. Flow cytometry and deformeter were used to assay the integrality and deformability of the RBC, respectively. The results showed that the NaCl solution osmotic concentrations were 160 mOsm and 121.4 mOsm, respectively when the haemolysis rate was 50% of the control group and the test group. Flow cytometry data demonstrated that incubation of RBC in a hypertonic trehalose solution resulted in a fraction of cells with different complexity that attached to little Annexin V-FITC, and that it could be removed by washing and resuspending the RBC in an iso-osmotic (300 mOsm PBS) medium. The deformability of the loaded RBC descend, the statistical difference was significant between control and test groups (P < 0.01). It is concluded that the membrane physiological and biochemistry stability and membrane integrality of RBC in a hyper osmotic pressure can be retained after trehalose loading.