RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Probing compression versus stretch activated recruitment of cortical actin and apical junction proteins using mechanical stimulations of suspended doublets
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 303644
DO 10.1101/303644
A1 Xumei Gao
A1 Bipul R. Acharya
A1 Wilfried Claude Otto Engl
A1 Richard De Mets
A1 Jean Paul Thiery
A1 Alpha S. Yap
A1 Virgile Viasnoff
YR 2018
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2018/04/18/303644.abstract
AB We report an experimental approach to study the mechanosensitivity of cellcell contact upon mechanical stimulation in suspended cell-doublets. The doublet is placed astride an hourglass aperture, and a hydrodynamic force is selectively exerted on only one of the cells. The geometry of the device concentrates the mechanical shear over the junction area. Together with mechanical shear, the system also allows confocal quantitative live imaging of the recruitment of junction proteins (e.g. E-cadherin, ZO-1, Occludin and actin). We observed the time sequence over which proteins were recruited to the stretched region of the contact. The compressed side of the contact showed no response. We demonstrated how this mechanism polarizes the stress-induced recruitment of junctional components within one single junction. Finally, we demonstrated that stabilizing the actin cortex dynamics abolishes the mechanosensitive response of the junction. Our experimental design provides an original approach to study the role of mechanical force at a cell-cell contact with unprecedented control over stress application and quantitative optical analysis.