Optically computed phase microscopy to assess cellular uptake of lipid nanoparticles

Area of Science:

• Biomedical optics
• Cell biology
• Nanotechnology

Background:

• Accurate imaging of cellular processes is crucial for understanding drug delivery.
• Lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) are promising drug carriers, but their cellular uptake needs precise evaluation.
• Existing imaging methods may lack the resolution or depth-specific information required for LNP assessment.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a novel optically computed phase microscopy (OCPM) system.
• To demonstrate OCPM's capability for depth-resolved phase imaging.
• To apply OCPM for assessing cellular uptake of lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) and optimizing LNP-based drug delivery systems.

Main Methods:

• Development of a novel optically computed phase microscopy (OCPM) system.
• Utilizing OCPM for quantitative phase contrast imaging.
• Application of OCPM to visualize and quantify the uptake of LNPs within cells.

Main Results:

• The OCPM system provides depth-resolved phase information.
• OCPM effectively visualizes and quantifies cellular association and internalization of LNPs.
• The system facilitates the assessment of LNP-cell interactions for drug delivery optimization.

Conclusions:

• OCPM is a powerful tool for high-resolution, depth-specific imaging in cell biology.
• This technique enables quantitative analysis of LNP cellular uptake.
• OCPM contributes to the advancement of LNP-based drug delivery system development.