Abstract

Automated Droplet Microfluidics for Studies of Emergence of Drug Resistance in Bacteria

Piotr Garstecki, Professor, Polish Academy Of Sciences

We describe a microfluidic system that supports microdroplet chemostats, allowing for parallel manipulation and monitoring of the continuous growth of multiple populations of bacteria. An automated network with a small number of input and output channels controls the formation and composition of hundreds of microdroplets in parallel. The system enables encapsulation of cells and manipulation of the composition of soluble chemical factors in each microdroplet independently over extended intervals of time. The technique introduces statistics into the study of adaptation of microorganisms to fluctuating chemical environments. The capabilities to rapidly adjust the phase of bacterial growth in experiments and the size and density of bacterial populations provide new opportunities for studying the genetic and phenotypic adaptation of bacteria and open a new window through which to view the processes of evolution. As such, the platform might provide a technology for highly parallel, long-term studies of microbial physiology, evolution, adaptation, and ecology with applications in fundamental research and in biotechnology.