Benchmarking electrical methods for rapid estimation of root biomass.

Background: To face climate change and subsequent rainfall instabilities, crop breeding strategies now include root traits phenotyping. Rapid estimation of root traits in controlled conditions can be achieved by using parallel electrical capacitance and its linear correlation with root dry mass. The aim of the present study was to improve robustness and efficiency of methods based on capacitance and other electrical variables, such as serial/parallel resistance, conductance, impedance or reactance.

Real-time single-cell response to stiffness.

Living cells adapt to the stiffness of their environment. However, cell response to stiffness is mainly thought to be initiated by the deformation of adhesion complexes under applied force. In order to determine whether cell response was triggered by stiffness or force, we have developed a unique method allowing us to tune, in real time, the effective stiffness experienced by a single living cell in a uniaxial traction geometry.