Dresden 2006 – scientific programme
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AKB: Biologische Physik
AKB 22: Sensory Biophysics and Signal Transduction
AKB 22.5: Talk
Thursday, March 30, 2006, 15:45–16:00, ZEU 255
Chemotaxis in Microfluid Channels — •Danica Wyatt1,2, Carsten Beta1,2, Wouter-Jan Rappel3, William Loomis4, and Eberhard Bodenschatz1,2 — 1Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, Goettingen — 2LASSP, Department of Physics, Cornell University — 3Department of Physics, University of California at San Diego — 4Division of Biological Sciences, University of California at San Diego
Directional sensing in eukaryotic cells has been subject of intensive research over the last decade. Much of this work has been done using the amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum as a model system. Dicty exhibits signaling pathways that appear to be well-conserved in mammalian chemotaxis. To investigate the dynamics of its signaling proteins, experiments must generate stimuli that can be controlled on the same time scale as the intracellular response. Also, it is essential to percisely characterize and manipulate the immediate chemical environment of a cell. Together, these requirements suggest an approach in which the chemoattractant is delivered directly to points of interest on the cell membrane. I will present microfluidic innovations for generating a variety of such stimuli and show how they led to observations of novel cell responses that could not be triggered by traditional experimental methods.