The advantages of microfluidics to study actin biochemistry and biomechanics

Autor: Emiko Suzuki, Guillaume Romet-Lemonne, Antoine Jégou, Hugo Wioland, Luyan Cao
Přispěvatelé: Institut Jacques Monod (IJM (UMR_7592)), Université Paris Diderot - Paris 7 (UPD7)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2019
Předmět:
Zdroj: Journal of Muscle Research and Cell Motility
Journal of Muscle Research and Cell Motility, Springer Verlag, 2019, ⟨10.1007/s10974-019-09564-4⟩
ISSN: 0142-4319
1573-2657
DOI: 10.1007/s10974-019-09564-4⟩
Popis: The regulated assembly of actin filaments is essential in nearly all cell types. Studying actin assembly dynamics can pose many technical challenges. A number of these challenges can be overcome by using microfluidics to observe and manipulate single actin filaments under an optical microscope. In particular, microfluidics can be tremendously useful for applying different mechanical stresses to actin filaments and determining how the physical context of the filaments affects their regulation by biochemical factors. In this review, we summarize the main features of microfluidics for the study of actin assembly dynamics, and we highlight some recent developments that have emerged from the combination of microfluidics and other techniques. We use two case studies to illustrate our points: the rapid assembly of actin filaments by formins and the disassembly of filaments by actin depolymerizing factor (ADF)/cofilin. Both of these protein families play important roles in cells. They regulate actin assembly through complex molecular mechanisms that are sensitive to the filaments’ mechanical context, with multiple activities that need to be quantified separately. Microfluidics-based experiments have been extremely useful for gaining insight into the regulatory actions of these two protein families.
Databáze: OpenAIRE
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