Precision acoustofluidics for high-throughput mechanobiology in suspension cells

Area of Science:

• Biotechnology
• Cellular Mechanobiology
• Acoustofluidics

Background:

• Mechanomodulation influences physiology, cancer therapy, immunology, and drug development.
• Stimulating nonadherent cells precisely is challenging, hindering mechanotransduction research.
• Targeted therapeutics development is limited by current cell stimulation methods.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a platform for precise, high-throughput mechanical stimulation of suspension cells.
• To investigate mechanotransduction pathways in nonadherent cells.
• To enable scalable applications in cancer research and drug screening.

Main Methods:

• Developed the acoustofluidic platform STREAM (Suspension-cell Targeted Response to Excitation via Acoustofluidic Mechanomodulation).
• Utilized 101.14-MHz high-frequency surface acoustic waves for mechanical stimulation.
• Achieved a throughput of 500,000 cells per minute.

Main Results:

• Precisely modulated intracellular calcium ion (Ca2+) signaling via mechanosensitive ion channels.
• Induced mitochondrial membrane disruption and tunable apoptosis in K562 leukemia cells (5.15% to 47.1%).
• Demonstrated high-throughput stimulation of suspension cells.

Conclusions:

• STREAM offers a scalable and precise tool for studying mechanotransduction in suspension cells.
• The platform has broad applications in cancer research, immunotherapy, and high-throughput drug screening.
• STREAM advances the precise control of cellular mechanical forces for therapeutic development.