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Programmed magnetic manipulation of vesicles into spatially coded prototissue architectures arrays
Qingchuan Li1, Shubin Li1, Xiangxiang Zhang1
1State Key Laboratory of Urban Water Resource and Environment, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, 92 West Da-Zhi Street, Harbin, 150001, China.
Nature Communications
|January 15, 2020
Summary
Researchers magnetically assembled giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) into robust tissue mimics. These protocell colonies exhibit enhanced stability and enable spatial biochemical reactions, outperforming individual GUVs.
Area of Science:
- Synthetic biology
- Biomaterials engineering
- Biophysics
Background:
- Cells naturally self-assemble into functional multicellular structures.
- Synthetic biology aims to replicate this for tissue engineering and smart materials.
- Creating organized, communicating micro-architectures from protocells, especially lipid vesicles, remains a challenge.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop a method for assembling protocell entities into spatially coded microstructures.
- To investigate the properties of these engineered tissue-like assemblies.
- To demonstrate the potential of protocell colonies over individual protocells.
Main Methods:
- Magnetic assembly of giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) or cells using a stainless steel mesh.
- Creation of spatially coded configurations and cascade biochemical reactions within GUV aggregates.
- Assessment of osmotic stability of assembled GUVs compared to individual GUV suspensions.
Main Results:
- Successfully assembled GUVs and cells into diverse microstructures with spatial coding.
- Achieved spatialized cascade biochemical reactions within the engineered GUV assemblies.
- Observed significantly enhanced osmotic stability in GUV aggregates compared to individual GUVs.
Conclusions:
- The magnetic assembly strategy provides a versatile and cost-effective method for creating robust tissue mimics.
- Protocell colonies, formed through this method, show potential advantages over individual protocells in terms of stability and function.
- This approach offers a promising route for developing advanced biomaterials and tissue engineering strategies.
