High-throughput mechanophenotyping of multicellular spheroids using a microfluidic micropipette aspiration chip

Area of Science:

• Biophysics
• Cell Biology
• Microfluidics

Background:

• Cell spheroids model tissue micro-environments.
• Mechanical properties of spheroids offer insights into tissue mechanics and self-organization.
• Existing techniques for spheroid mechanical characterization are often low-throughput and complex.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a high-throughput, easy-to-handle microfluidic chip for quantifying spheroid viscoelastic behavior.
• To enable mechanophenotyping of different tissue types.
• To investigate the relationship between cellular properties and tissue behavior.

Main Methods:

• Development of a microfluidic chip based on glass capillary micropipette aspiration.
• Parallel loading of spheroids into microfluidic pockets.
• Aspiration of spheroid portions into channels using hydrostatic pressure.
• Easy removal and replacement of spheroids for successive measurements.

Main Results:

• The chip allows for high-throughput measurement of tens of spheroids per day.
• Accurate deformation data was obtained at various aspiration pressures.
• Viscoelastic properties of different cell line spheroids were measured and found consistent with prior studies.

Conclusions:

• The developed microfluidic chip offers a high-throughput method for assessing cell spheroid viscoelasticity.
• This tool facilitates mechanophenotyping of tissues and studying cell-tissue mechanics links.
• The chip simplifies the study of mechanical forces in biological systems.