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Low Stress Ion Conductance Microscopy of Sub-Cellular Stiffness.

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

Type

Article

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Authors

Clarke, Richard W 
Novak, Pavel 
Zhukov, Alexander 
Tyler, Eleanor J 
Cano-Jaimez, Marife 

Abstract

Directly examining subcellular mechanics whilst avoiding excessive strain of a live cell requires the precise control of light stress on very small areas, which is fundamentally difficult. Here we use a glass nanopipet out of contact with the plasma membrane to both exert the stress on the cell and also accurately monitor cellular compression. This allows the mapping of cell stiffness at a lateral resolution finer than 100 nm. We calculate the stress a nanopipet exerts on a cell as the sum of the intrinsic pressure between the tip face and the plasma membrane plus its direct pressure on any glycocalyx, both evaluated from the gap size in terms of the ion current decrease. A survey of cell types confirms that an intracellular pressure of approximately 120 Pa begins to detach the plasma membrane from the cytoskeleton and reveals that the first 0.66 ± 0.09 μm of compression of a neuron cell body is much softer than previous methods have been able to detect.

Description

Keywords

Animals, Cell Line, Cell Membrane, Cells, Cultured, Cytoplasm, Cytoskeleton, Fibroblasts, Humans, Ions, Microscopy, Neurons, Rats

Journal Title

Soft Matter

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

1744-683X
1744-6848

Volume Title

12

Publisher

Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
Sponsorship
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BB/L006227/1)
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/H01098X/1)
Medical Research Council (G0701057)
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (Grant ID: BB/L006227/1), Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (Grant ID: EP/H01098X/1), Medical Research Council (Grant IDs: G0701057, MR/K501372/1), Herchel Smith Postdoctoral Fellowship, Royal Society of Chemistry Analytical Chemistry Trust Fund