Cell-based microsystems

Summary form only given as follows: Biomedical applications of microfabricated devices is no longer limited to nonliving systems as genes-on-a-chip or lab-on-a-chip, recent advances in the understanding of cellular behavior in micro-environments have started to pave the way toward living microdevices. These emerging devices are expected to become key technologies in the 21st century of medicine with a broad range of applications varying from diagnostic, tissue engineered products, cell-based high throughput drug screening tools, and basic molecular biology tools. They will also include multiple cell types and/or genetically engineered cells to investigate complex interactions between cells from different tissues. These sophisticated devices will contain micro-engineered tissue units coupled to each other by complex microfluidic handling network. Microfluidic mixing systems will also precisely regulate the composition and concentration of drugs to be tested. This presentation will briefly review the early historical literature on the use of microtechnologies in cellular systems and then focus on fundamental aspects of integrating cells into micro-devices. Special emphasis will be placed on cell-substrate and cell-cell interactions, and chemical and microfluidic approaches to control spatial distribution of cells on biocompatible surfaces. Next, several emerging areas of applications will be discussed including liver and skin tissue engineering using microfabrication, the use of dielectropheresis to create cellular arrays for rapid screening, and microfluidic cellular chemotaxis assays.