A Microfluidic Dielectric Spectroscopy System for Characterization of Biological Cells in Physiological Media

Dielectric spectroscopy (DS) is a promising cell screening method that can be used for diagnostic and drug discovery purposes. The primary challenge of using DS in physiological buffers is the electrode polarization (EP) that overwhelms the impedance signal within a large frequency range. These effects further amplify with the miniaturization of the measurement electrodes. In this study, we present a microfluidic system and the associated equivalent circuit models for real-time measurements of cell membrane capacitance and cytoplasm resistance in physiological buffers with 10 s increments. The current device captures several hundreds of biological cells in individual microwells through gravitational settling and measures the system’s impedance using microelectrodes covered with dendritic gold nanostructures. Using PC-3 cells (a highly metastatic prostate cancer cell line) suspended in cell growth media (CGM), we demonstrate stable measurements of cell membrane capacitance and cytoplasm resistance in the device for over 15 min. We also describe a consistent application of the equivalent circuit model, starting from the reference measurements used to determine the system parameters. The circuit model is tested using devices with varying dimensions, and the obtained cell parameters between different devices are nearly identical. Further analyses of the impedance data have shown that accurate cell membrane capacitance and cytoplasm resistance can be extracted using a limited number of measurements in the 5 MHz to 10 MHz range. This will potentially reduce the timescale required for real-time DS measurements below 1 s. Overall, the new microfluidic device can be used for the dielectric characterization of biological cells in physiological buffers for various cell screening applications.

Bioinspired Networks of Communicating Synthetic Protocells

The bottom-up synthesis of cell-like entities or protocells from inanimate molecules and materials is one of the grand challenges of our time. In the past decade, researchers in the emerging field of bottom-up synthetic biology have developed different protocell models and engineered them to mimic one or more abilities of biological cells, such as information transcription and translation, adhesion, and enzyme-mediated metabolism. Whilst thus far efforts have focused on increasing the biochemical complexity of individual protocells, an emerging challenge in bottom-up synthetic biology is the development of networks of communicating synthetic protocells. The possibility of engineering multi-protocellular systems capable of sending and receiving chemical signals to trigger individual or collective programmed cell-like behaviours or for communicating with living cells and tissues would lead to major scientific breakthroughs with important applications in biotechnology, tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. This mini-review will discuss this new, emerging area of bottom-up synthetic biology and will introduce three types of bioinspired networks of communicating synthetic protocells that have recently emerged.

A Mathematical Model for Controlling Exchanged Spinor Waves between Hemoglobin, Tumor and T-Cells

To date, it is known that tumor cells respond to attacks of T-cells by producing some PD-1/PD-L1 and other connections. Unfortunately, medical methods for preventing these connections are expensive and sometimes non-effective. In this study, we suggest a new way for reducing these connections by producing some noise in the exchanged information between tumor cells, T-cells, hemoglobin, and controller cells such as those of the heart or brain. In this model, we assume that human cells use spinor waves for exchanging information because the velocity of exchanged information between two spinors, which are located a large distance apart, exceeds the velocity of light. In fact, two spinors could send and receive information from each other instantaneously. In this hypothesis, the DNAs within heart cells, brain cells or any controller are built from some spinors such as electrons, and by their motion, some waves are generated. These spinor waves are received by iron atoms and multi-gonal molecules within hemoglobin and other spinors within the blood vessels. The hemoglobin molecules are located on some blood cells, move along the blood vessels and pass on their information to cells, proteins and RNAs. The spins of the spinors within the hemoglobin and also the spins of the charges and ions within the blood vessels are entangled and could transmit any information between cells. Thus, when a tumor is formed, its spinor waves change, and are transmitted rapidly into the heart cells, brain cells and other controller cells. The heart, brain or other controller cells diagnose these quantum waves, and by using the entanglement between the spinors within the blood vessels and the hemoglobin, send some messages to the T-cells. These messages are received by tumor cells and they become ready to respond to attacks. To prevent the reception of information by tumor cells, we can make use of some extra cells or hemoglobin, which interact with spinors and hemoglobin around tumor cells and produce some noise. Science quantum spinor waves are minute and have minor power and intensity; we cannot detect them by our present electronic devices and for this reason, we suggest using biological cells. This is a hypothesis; however, if experiments show its validity, some types of cancers could be cured or controlled by this method. We formulate the model by considering quantum entanglement between spinors within biological systems. By changing any spin within this system, all spins change and consequently, information is transmitted immediately. Then, we add new spinors to this system mathematically, and show that this causes the correlations between the initial spinors to reduce. Thus, the spinors of the extra hemoglobin or cells could act like noise, and prevent reception of real information by tumor cells.

A Microfluidic Dielectric Spectroscopy System for Characterization of Biological Cells in Physiological Media

Dielectric spectroscopy (DS) is a promising cell screening method that can be used for diagnostic and drug discovery purposes. The primary challenge of using DS in physiological buffers is the electrode polarization (EP) that overwhelms the impedance signal within a large frequency range. These effects further amplify with miniaturization of the measurement electrodes. In this study, we present a microfluidic system and the associated equivalent circuit models for real-time measurements of cell membrane capacitance and cytoplasm resistance in physiological buffers with 10s increments. The current device captures several hundreds of biological cells in individual microwells through gravitational settling and measures the system’s impedance using microelectrodes covered with dendritic gold nanostructures. Using PC-3 cells (a highly metastatic prostate cancer cell line) suspended in cell growth media (CGM), we demonstrate stable measurements of cell membrane capacitance and cytoplasm resistance in the device for over 15 minutes. We also describe a consistent application of the equivalent circuit model, starting from the reference measurements used to determine the system parameters. The circuit model is tested using devices with varying dimensions, and the obtained cell parameters between different devices are nearly identical. Further analyses of the impedance data have shown that accurate cell membrane capacitance and cytoplasm resistance can be extracted using a limited number of measurements in the 5 MHz to 10 MHz range. This will potentially reduce the timescale required for real-time DS measurements below 1s. Overall the new microfluidic device can be used for dielectric characterization of biological cells in physiological buffers for various cell screening applications.

Enterprise Development with P Systems

Enterprises are both an emerging force in national reform and a major force in its future economic development. The professors in China and on abroad have do much research on enterprise development and put forward lots of valuable theories. P systems have been proposed for about 14 years, and its applications refer to numbers of areas. However, to investigate the survival and development of firms in the aspect of P systems is rarely. In this study, it makes analysis on the survival and development of small and medium-sized enterprises in an aspect of bionics, trying to find out the origin which makes the enterprise exuberant and everlasting. Have the enterprises compare to biological cells and construct a membrane framework in order to interpret an enterprise’s survival. At the same time it also highlights the irreplaceable role of enterprise DNA in the inheritance of the enterprise entity.

Optical Fiber Tweezers for the Assembly of Living Photonic Probes

Optical fiber tweezers, as a versatile tool for optical trapping and manipulation, have attracted much attention in cell trapping, manipulation, and detection. Particularly, assembly of living cells using optical fiber tweezes has become a significant attention. Advanced achievements have been made on the assembly of fully biocompatible photonic probes with biological cells, enabling optical detection in biological environment in a highly compatible manner. Therefore, in this chapter, we discuss the use of optical fiber tweezers for assembly of living photonic probes. Living photonic probes can be assembled by the trapping and assembly of multiple cells using optical fiber tweezers. These photonic probes exhibit high biocompatibility and show great promise for the bio-applications in bio-microenvironments.