Thickness and biopolymer coat standardization for culture of MCF7 cells on polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) surface and off-chip retrieval of methacrylated gelatin gel from PDMS

摘要

Poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) platforms can be molded into desirable shapes and patterns, thereby increasing their usefulness in developing architecturally well-defined tissue constructs. PDMS surface, being hydrophobic, needs a further coating of a biocompatible polymer to facilitate cell culture. In this study, we have reported a novel approach for coating capillary walls with PDMS. Further, we have compared the growth of cells on collagen and gelatin coated PDMS surfaces of varying thicknesses and PDMS coated capillaries. Therapeutic relevance of the cells cultured in defined patterns on PDMS platforms can be increased if they could be detached from the PDMS surface keeping the patterns intact. We tested the ability of a biocompatible methacrylated gelatin gel (GelMA) to be detached from PDMS surface. We have also demonstrated that GelMA can be pushed out of a PDMS coated glass capillary as intact cylindrical threads. This study is a breakthrough in extending the usability of PDMS platforms by exploiting the architectural flexibility of PDMS and the property of GelMA to get detached from PDMS.