DNA hybridization helps protein-mediated cell adhesion for tissue engineering
DNA hybridization helps protein-mediated cell adhesion for tissue engineering lead image
Cell adhesion is the first step to developing multicellular tissues, and therefore, its control is essential for creating functional artificial tissues. To understand how cell adhesion is influenced by artificial adhesion via synthetic molecules, Togo et al. studied the effects of DNA hybridization, a process by which complementary DNA strands recombine after separation.
“In nature, cells form highly ordered, complex tissues by utilizing various types of cell adhesion molecules (CAMs),” said author Hiroshi Yoshikawa. “Tissue-like structures obtained via artificial interactions do not always result in the expression of desired biological functions because of the lack of cell adhesion via CAMs.”
The authors found artificial adhesion via DNA hybridization can promote cell adhesion through the mediation of cell adhesion proteins called E-cadherin. This is a two-step process, where the DNA hybridization promotes physical contact and artificial adhesion between the cells within a few minutes, and binding between E-cadherin proteins fosters biological adhesion on a longer timescale.
By seeding human breast epithelial cell cultures onto a planar lipid membrane that binds to E-cadherin, the group was able to determine the adhesion area between the cells and the membrane using a combination of imaging techniques. Fluorescence and interference microscopy were used to resolve which adhesion areas were mediated by DNA hybridization and which were mediated by E-cadherin.
“This work has shown the importance of the rational design of molecular structures on the regulation of CAM-mediated adhesion,” Yoshikawa said. “Our finding of the promotion of cell adhesion via DNA hybridization is one of the representative examples along such notion.”
Source: “Quantitative evaluation of the impact of artificial cell adhesion via DNA Hybridization on E-cadherin-mediated cell adhesion,” by Shodai Togo, Ken Sato, Ryuzo Kawamura, Naritaka Kobayashi, Makoto Noiri, Seiichiro Nakabayashi, Yuji Teramura, and Hiroshi Y. Yoshikawa, APL Bioengineering (2020). The article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5123749 .
