Liposome-based liquid handling platform featuring addition, mixing, and aliquoting of femtoliter volumes.

This paper describes the utilization of giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) as a platform for handling chemical and biochemical reagents. GUVs with diameters of 5 to 10 µm and containing chemical/biochemical reagents together with inert polymers were fused with electric pulses (electrofusion). After reagent mixing, the fused GUVs spontaneously deformed to a budding shape, separating the mixed solution into sub-volumes.