Parallelized label-free monitoring of cell adhesion on extracellular matrix proteins measured by single colour reflectometry

Abstract

The understanding of the initial cell adhesion to biomaterials is crucial for the survival of implants. The manifold possibilities to tailor an implant surface and the diverse requirements for different implant applications necessitate a timesaving and highly parallelized analytical methodology. Due to its intrinsic advantages (label-free, time-resolved, robust against temperature fluctuations, and particularly the multiplexing possibilities), single colour reflectometry (SCORE) is used for the first time to investigate cell adhesion to different extracellular matrix protein–coated surfaces. The excellent correlation between the novel SCORE technology and well-established reference methods proves that the results obtained by using this direct optical method are able to reflect the cell binding processes at the transducer surface. Additionally, the high time resolution of SCORE revealed the differences in the adhesion behaviour of the cells on the different extracellular matrix protein–coated glass slides during the initial adsorption phase and during the spreading of the cells on the surfaces. Therefore, we conclude that SCORE is a perfectly suited methodology for studying the entire cell adsorption process, including morphological changes, and shows great potential for other cell-based sensing applications. Graphical abstract

Metasurface-enhanced infrared spectroscopy in multiwell format for real-time assaying of live cells

“…Different surface coatings are routinely used for culturing cells on flat substrates, including collagen, laminin, fibronectin, and poly-D-lysine (PDL). [32][33][34]47,48 The effectiveness of these surface coatings for different cell lines can be difficult to predict a priori and typically needs to be determined experimentally. We used a 16-well MIMA to interrogate cell adhesion to four different coating conditions: no coating, fibronectin, poly-D-lysine, and 10% fetal bovine serum, which simulates typical cell culture conditions.…”