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Automated Direct Micropatterning Platform for bespoke in vitro cell microenvironment using Molecular Plasma

Funder: UK Research and InnovationProject code: MR/X012891/1
Funded under: MRC Funder Contribution: 223,982 GBP

Automated Direct Micropatterning Platform for bespoke in vitro cell microenvironment using Molecular Plasma

Description

In vitro platforms are key tools to answer fundamental questions about biology and diseases. One of the strategies to produce a complex cell culture system is micropatterning, enabling control over cell and tissue architecture in vitro to explore and dissect the relationship between cell and tissue architecture and resulting function and behaviour configurations in various fields such as disease modelling, immunology, or neurobiology. The two main techniques used for micropatterning, micro contract printing and deep UV micropatterning, require complex, multistep, manual operations, lengthy incubation time, and are limited in application and reproducibility therefore not suitable for high throughput assays and limited in their applications and development. As part of its Biomaterial and Microfluidics service, the Making Lab wishes to take advantage of the recent advances in molecular plasma for patterning to propose a cutting-edge fully automated equipment, whose rapid implementation, simplicity of operation and versatility will immediately benefit research at the Crick Cold atmospheric Molecular plasma is an interesting technology that use the plasma as a vector to graft various chemistry (antibodies, peptides, proteins, epoxy, acrylic, etc) directly onto any substrate in a single-step, solvent-free, scalable atmospheric process at room temperature. Moreover, this process can be adapted to any type of support used in biology including s challenging ones used for low volumes or high throughput experiments. Combining micropatterning masks (i.e. mask with negative features letting the plasma and molecules imprint them on the support's surface), a cold atmospheric plasma with coaxial biomolecule deposition, and a computer numerical control (CNC) manufacturing system, it allows programming and automation of surface treatment. In practice, a stream of inert gas is used to create a plasma projected through a pattern on the support's surface while a solution containing the molecule in aerosol form is coaxially distributed to bind to the plasma on the surface. The coating sequence is programmed on the machine's software and can be adapted to any type of surface and dish fitting into an A4 surface. A custom adapter placed on top of the plasma allows the use of multiple heads to allow the coating of the entire surface, parts only or patterns. The proposed development of a custom writing plasma head for the instrument and the associated protocols to apply it to biological research represents a unique opportunity to significantly increase the impact that this instrument could have on the development of new project Ultimately this equipment allows to address a wide range of areas such as cell growth, cell migration, organdies, microfabrication of microstructures substrate and microfluidics. This technology will immediately benefit laboratories working in the areas of bioengineering, developmental biology, cell biology, infection and immunity, gene regulation, neuroscience, nanofabrication, biosensing. For example, it will help better understand the dynamic interactions between human macrophages and Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) during early infection state, or describe the dynamic behind the vascular topology, contribute to finding ways to model the nervous system more accurately and see how conditions like motor neurone disease (MND) damage it and to automatically assay arrays of 3D cell cultures to enable their use in drug discovery.

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