Encapsulating cells within biocompatible materials is a widely used strategy for cell delivery and tissue engineering. While cells are commonly suspended within bulk hydrogel-forming solutions during gelation, substantial interest in the microfluidic fabrication of miniaturized cell encapsulation vehicles has more recently emerged. Here, we utilize multiphase microfluidics to encapsulate cells within photopolymerized picoliter-volume water-in-oil droplets at high production rates.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe mitotic spindle must function in cell types that vary greatly in size, and its dimensions scale with the rapid, reductive cell divisions that accompany early stages of development. The mechanism responsible for this scaling is unclear, because uncoupling cell size from a developmental or cellular context has proven experimentally challenging. We combined microfluidic technology with Xenopus egg extracts to characterize spindle assembly within discrete, geometrically defined volumes of cytoplasm.
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