Real-time imaging of cellular forces using optical interference

Andrew T. Meek, Nils M. Kronenberg, Andrew Morton, Philipp Liehm, Jan Murawski, Eleni Dalaka, Jonathan H. Booth, Simon J. Powis and Malte C. Gather ()
Additional contact information
Andrew T. Meek: University of St Andrews, North Haugh
Nils M. Kronenberg: University of St Andrews, North Haugh
Andrew Morton: University of St Andrews, North Haugh
Philipp Liehm: University of St Andrews, North Haugh
Jan Murawski: University of St Andrews, North Haugh
Eleni Dalaka: University of St Andrews, North Haugh
Jonathan H. Booth: University of St Andrews, North Haugh
Simon J. Powis: University of St Andrews, North Haugh
Malte C. Gather: University of St Andrews, North Haugh

Nature Communications, 2021, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract Important dynamic processes in mechanobiology remain elusive due to a lack of tools to image the small cellular forces at play with sufficient speed and throughput. Here, we introduce a fast, interference-based force imaging method that uses the illumination of an elastic deformable microcavity with two rapidly alternating wavelengths to map forces. We show real-time acquisition and processing of data, obtain images of mechanical activity while scanning across a cell culture, and investigate sub-second fluctuations of the piconewton forces exerted by macrophage podosomes. We also demonstrate force imaging of beating neonatal cardiomyocytes at 100 fps which reveals mechanical aspects of spontaneous oscillatory contraction waves in between the main contraction cycles. These examples illustrate the wider potential of our technique for monitoring cellular forces with high throughput and excellent temporal resolution.

Date: 2021
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-23734-4 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:12:y:2021:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-021-23734-4

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-23734-4

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().