scholarly journals Modelling biochemical gradients in vitro to control cell compartmentalization in a microengineered 3D model of the intestinal epithelium

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gizem Altay ◽  
Aina Abad-Lazaro ◽  
Emilio Jose Gualda ◽  
Jordi Folch ◽  
Claudia Insa ◽  
...  

Gradients of signaling pathways within the intestinal stem cell (ISC) niche are instrumental for cellular compartmentalization and tissue function, yet how are they formed and sensed by the epithelium is still not fully understood. Here we present a new in vitro model of the small intestine based on primary epithelial cells (i), apically accessible (ii), with native tissue mechanical properties and controlled mesh size (iii), 3D villus-like architecture (iv), and biomolecular gradients of the ISC niche (v). Biochemical gradients are formed through the hydrogel-based scaffolds by free diffusion from a source to a sink chamber. To confirm the establishment of precise spatiotemporally controlled gradients, we employ light-sheet fluorescence microscopy and in-silico modelling. The ISC niche biochemical gradients applied along the villus axis lead to the in vivo-like compartmentalization of the proliferative and differentiated cells, while changing the composition and concentration of the biochemical factors affects the cellular organization along the villus axis. This novel 3D in vitro intestinal model derived from organoids recapitulates both the villus-like architecture and the gradients of ISC biochemical factors, thus opening the possibility to study in vitro the nature of such gradients and the resulting cellular response.

2018 ◽  
Vol 30 (8) ◽  
pp. 1154 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne-Laure Nivet ◽  
Isabelle Dufort ◽  
Isabelle Gilbert ◽  
Marc-André Sirard

In reproduction, FSH is one of the most important hormones, especially in females, because it controls the number of follicles and the rate of follicular growth. Although several studies have examined the follicular response at the transcriptome level, it is difficult to obtain a clear and complete picture of the genes responding to an increase in FSH in an in vivo context because follicles undergo rapid morphological and physical changes during their growth. To help define the transcriptome downstream response to FSH, an in vitro model was used in the present study to observe the short-term (4 h) cellular response. Gene expression analysis highlighted a set of novel transcripts that had not been reported previously as being part of the FSH response. Moreover, the results of the present study indicate that the epithelial to mesenchymal transition pathway is inhibited by short-term FSH stimuli, maintaining follicles in a growth phase and preventing differentiation. Modulating gene expression in vitro has physiological limitations, but it can help assess the potential downstream response and begin the mapping of the granulosa cell transcriptome in relation to FSH. This information is a key feature to help discriminate between the effects of FSH and LH, or to elucidate the overlapping of insulin-like growth factor 1 and FSH in the granulosa mitogenic response.


2000 ◽  
Author(s):  
James H.-C. Wang ◽  
David Stone ◽  
Fengyan Jia ◽  
Chris Celechovsky ◽  
Savio L.-Y. Woo

Abstract Because of the advantage of better control of experimental conditions, in vitro model systems have been developed to examine the effects of mechanical loading on cells. Previous studies have shown that cyclic stretching causes cells to change orientation, proliferation and gene expression (Buck et al., 1980; Wang et al., 1995; Leung et al., 1976). However, one drawback of these model systems is that they are unable to control cell alignment and shape, and in addition, some provide heterogeneous strains to cells during stretching (See review by Schaffer, 1994). Consequently, cellular responses in these systems may not be similar to those in vivo. For example, tendon and ligament fibroblasts align with collagen fibers in vivo and are hence subjected to stretching along the tissue long axis. In contrast, in many existing systems, cells either randomly orient or orient away from the stretching direction.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Agavi Stavropoulou Tatla ◽  
Alexander W. Justin ◽  
Colin Watts ◽  
Athina E. Markaki

AbstractGlioblastoma (GBM) angiogenesis is critical for tumor growth and recurrence, making it a compelling therapeutic target. Here, a disease-relevant, vascularized tumoroid in vitro model with stem-like features and stromal surrounds is reported. The model is used to recapitulate how individual components of the GBM’s complex brain microenvironment such as hypoxia, vasculature-related stromal cells and growth factors support GBM angiogenesis. It is scalable, tractable, cost-effective and can be used with biologically-derived or biomimetic matrices. Patient-derived primary GBM cells are found to closely participate in blood vessel formation in contrast to a GBM cell line containing differentiated cells. Exogenous growth factors amplify this effect under normoxia but not at hypoxia suggesting that a significant amount of growth factors is already being produced under hypoxic conditions. Under hypoxia, primary GBM cells strongly co-localize with umbilical vein endothelial cells to form sprouting vascular networks, which has been reported to occur in vivo. These findings demonstrate that our 3D tumoroid in vitro model exhibits biomimetic attributes that may permit its use as a preclinical model in studying microenvironment cues of tumor angiogenesis.


2021 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muhammad Awais ◽  
Waqar Hussain ◽  
Nouman Rasool ◽  
Yaser Daanial Khan

Background: The uncontrolled growth due to accumulation of genetic and epigenetic changes as a result of loss or reduction in the normal function of Tumor Suppressor Genes (TSGs) and Pro-oncogenes is known as cancer. TSGs control cell division and growth by repairing of DNA mistakes during replication and restrict the unwanted proliferation of a cell or activities, those are the part of tumor production. Objectives: This study aims to propose a novel, accurate, user-friendly model to predict tumor suppressor proteins, which would be freely available to experimental molecular biologists to assist them using in vitro and in vivo studies. Methods: The predictor model has used the input feature vector (IFV) calculated from the physicochemical properties of proteins based on FCNN to compute the accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, and MCC. The proposed model was validated against different exhaustive validation techniques i.e. self-consistency and cross-validation. Results: Using self-consistency, the accuracy is 99%, for cross-validation and independent testing has 99.80% and 100% accuracy respectively. The overall accuracy of the proposed model is 99%, sensitivity value 98% and specificity 99% and F1-score was 0.99. Conclusion: It concludes, the proposed model for prediction of the tumor suppressor proteins can predict the tumor suppressor proteins efficiently, but it still has space for improvements in computational ways as the protein sequences may rapidly increase, day by day.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (5) ◽  
pp. 2530
Author(s):  
Bijean D. Ford ◽  
Diego Moncada Giraldo ◽  
Camilla Margaroli ◽  
Vincent D. Giacalone ◽  
Milton R. Brown ◽  
...  

Cystic fibrosis (CF) lung disease is dominated by the recruitment of myeloid cells (neutrophils and monocytes) from the blood which fail to clear the lung of colonizing microbes. In prior in vitro studies, we showed that blood neutrophils migrated through the well-differentiated lung epithelium into the CF airway fluid supernatant (ASN) mimic the dysfunction of CF airway neutrophils in vivo, including decreased bactericidal activity despite an increased metabolism. Here, we hypothesized that, in a similar manner to neutrophils, blood monocytes undergo significant adaptations upon recruitment to CFASN. To test this hypothesis, primary human blood monocytes were transmigrated in our in vitro model into the ASN from healthy control (HC) or CF subjects to mimic in vivo recruitment to normal or CF airways, respectively. Surface phenotype, metabolic and bacterial killing activities, and transcriptomic profile by RNA sequencing were quantified post-transmigration. Unlike neutrophils, monocytes were not metabolically activated, nor did they show broad differences in activation and scavenger receptor expression upon recruitment to the CFASN compared to HCASN. However, monocytes recruited to CFASN showed decreased bactericidal activity. RNASeq analysis showed strong effects of transmigration on monocyte RNA profile, with differences between CFASN and HCASN conditions, notably in immune signaling, including lower expression in the former of the antimicrobial factor ISG15, defensin-like chemokine CXCL11, and nitric oxide-producing enzyme NOS3. While monocytes undergo qualitatively different adaptations from those seen in neutrophils upon recruitment to the CF airway microenvironment, their bactericidal activity is also dysregulated, which could explain why they also fail to protect CF airways from infection.


Molecules ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (5) ◽  
pp. 1424
Author(s):  
Seyeon Oh ◽  
Myeongjoo Son ◽  
Joonhong Park ◽  
Donghwan Kang ◽  
Kyunghee Byun

Rosacea is a skin inflammatory condition that is accompanied by not only redness and flushing but also unseen symptoms, such as burning, stinging, and itching. TRPV1 expression in UVB-exposed skin can lead to a painful burning sensation. Upregulated TRPV1 expression helps release neuropeptides, including calcitonin gene-related peptide, pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating polypeptide, and vasoactive intestinal peptide, which can activate macrophage and inflammatory molecules. In this study, we found that radiofrequency (RF) irradiation reduced TRPV1 activation and neuropeptide expression in a UVB-exposed in vivo model and UVB- or heat-treated in an in vitro model. RF irradiation attenuated neuropeptide-induced macrophage activation and inflammatory molecule expression. Interestingly, the burning sensation in the skin of UVB-exposed mice and patients with rosacea was significantly decreased by RF irradiation. These results can provide experimental and molecular evidence on the effective use of RF irradiation for the burning sensation in patients with rosacea.


Author(s):  
Susan Gallogly ◽  
Takeshi Fujisawa ◽  
John D. Hung ◽  
Mairi Brittan ◽  
Elizabeth M. Skinner ◽  
...  

Abstract Purpose Endothelial dysfunction is central to the pathogenesis of acute coronary syndrome. The study of diseased endothelium is very challenging due to inherent difficulties in isolating endothelial cells from the coronary vascular bed. We sought to isolate and characterise coronary endothelial cells from patients undergoing thrombectomy for myocardial infarction to develop a patient-specific in vitro model of endothelial dysfunction. Methods In a prospective cohort study, 49 patients underwent percutaneous coronary intervention with thrombus aspiration. Specimens were cultured, and coronary endothelial outgrowth (CEO) cells were isolated. CEO cells, endothelial cells isolated from peripheral blood, explanted coronary arteries, and umbilical veins were phenotyped and assessed functionally in vitro and in vivo. Results CEO cells were obtained from 27/37 (73%) atherothrombotic specimens and gave rise to cells with cobblestone morphology expressing CD146 (94 ± 6%), CD31 (87 ± 14%), and von Willebrand factor (100 ± 1%). Proliferation of CEO cells was impaired compared to both coronary artery and umbilical vein endothelial cells (population doubling time, 2.5 ± 1.0 versus 1.6 ± 0.3 and 1.2 ± 0.3 days, respectively). Cell migration was also reduced compared to umbilical vein endothelial cells (29 ± 20% versus 85±19%). Importantly, unlike control endothelial cells, dysfunctional CEO cells did not incorporate into new vessels or promote angiogenesis in vivo. Conclusions CEO cells can be reliably isolated and cultured from thrombectomy specimens in patients with acute coronary syndrome. Compared to controls, patient-derived coronary endothelial cells had impaired capacity to proliferate, migrate, and contribute to angiogenesis. CEO cells could be used to identify novel therapeutic targets to enhance endothelial function and prevent acute coronary syndromes.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 855
Author(s):  
Paola Serrano Martinez ◽  
Lorena Giuranno ◽  
Marc Vooijs ◽  
Robert P. Coppes

Radiotherapy is involved in the treatment of many cancers, but damage induced to the surrounding normal tissue is often inevitable. Evidence suggests that the maintenance of homeostasis and regeneration of the normal tissue is driven by specific adult tissue stem/progenitor cells. These tasks involve the input from several signaling pathways. Irradiation also targets these stem/progenitor cells, triggering a cellular response aimed at achieving tissue regeneration. Here we discuss the currently used in vitro and in vivo models and the involved specific tissue stem/progenitor cell signaling pathways to study the response to irradiation. The combination of the use of complex in vitro models that offer high in vivo resemblance and lineage tracing models, which address organ complexity constitute potential tools for the study of the stem/progenitor cellular response post-irradiation. The Notch, Wnt, Hippo, Hedgehog, and autophagy signaling pathways have been found as crucial for driving stem/progenitor radiation-induced tissue regeneration. We review how these signaling pathways drive the response of solid tissue-specific stem/progenitor cells to radiotherapy and the used models to address this.


Micromachines ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 346
Author(s):  
Hui Ling Ma ◽  
Ana Carolina Urbaczek ◽  
Fayene Zeferino Ribeiro de Souza ◽  
Paulo Augusto Gomes Garrido Carneiro Leão ◽  
Janice Rodrigues Perussi ◽  
...  

Microfluidics is an essential technique used in the development of in vitro models for mimicking complex biological systems. The microchip with microfluidic flows offers the precise control of the microenvironment where the cells can grow and structure inside channels to resemble in vivo conditions allowing a proper cellular response investigation. Hence, this study aimed to develop low-cost, simple microchips to simulate the shear stress effect on the human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC). Differentially from other biological microfluidic devices described in the literature, we used readily available tools like heat-lamination, toner printer, laser cutter and biocompatible double-sided adhesive tapes to bind different layers of materials together, forming a designed composite with a microchannel. In addition, we screened alternative substrates, including polyester-toner, polyester-vinyl, glass, Permanox® and polystyrene to compose the microchips for optimizing cell adhesion, then enabling these microdevices when coupled to a syringe pump, the cells can withstand the fluid shear stress range from 1 to 4 dyne cm2. The cell viability was monitored by acridine orange/ethidium bromide (AO/EB) staining to detect live and dead cells. As a result, our fabrication processes were cost-effective and straightforward. The materials investigated in the assembling of the microchips exhibited good cell viability and biocompatibility, providing a dynamic microenvironment for cell proliferation. Therefore, we suggest that these microchips could be available everywhere, allowing in vitro assays for daily laboratory experiments and further developing the organ-on-a-chip concept.


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