A novel micromanipulation technique for measuring the bursting strength of single mammalian cells

✍ Scribed by Z. Zhang; M. A. Ferenczi; A. C. Lush; C. R. Thomas

• Publisher: Springer
• Year: 1991
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 339 KB
• Volume: 36
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1432-0614
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00164421

✦ Synopsis

Information about the bursting strength of animal cells is essential if the mechanisms of cell damage in bioreactors are to be understood, and if cell mechanical properties are ever to be related to cell structure and physiology. We have developed a novel cell compression technique that makes it possible to directly measure the bursting strength of single mammalian cells, and to infer information about cell mechanical properties. modulus of the cell, but not the bursting strength. The main problem in measuring the bursting strength of single mammaJian cells is the difficulty of measuring accurately the force required to cause a known large deformation of a cell. A technique based on micromanipulation has therefore been developed to measure the bursting strength of single cells and, by modelling of the cells (to be reported elsewhere), to derive other information such as the cell compressibility modulus and shear modulus.