Abstract

Microfluidics Trapping Systems For Cell Engineering and Assays

Lidong Qin, Professor/CPRIT Scholar, Houston Methodist Research Institute

Cellular and molecular assays, especially in the study of phenotype-genotype correlations at the single-cell level, are critical for the understanding of intratumor heterogeneity and identification of cancer phenotype-related genes and new cell subsets, and assist in cancer prevention, diagnosis, and therapy. Traditional technologies for single-cell manipulation and analysis are often limited by operational complexity, limited efficiency, and/or low-throughout. Integrated microfluidics devices have become a robust technique for single-cell manipulation. By the rational design of microfluidics platforms, we can achieve rapid and high-throughput cellular and molecular assays, including (1) single cell based analysis such as Block-Cell-Printing for live single-cell printing, Single-Cell Pipette for convenient single-cell isolation, and yeast chips for high-throughput analysis of yeast replicative aging, (2) double cells based assay such as vertical cell pairing for high-resolution imaging of the immunological synapse, and (3) CRISPR/Cas9 based genome editing for hard-to-transfect cells.