RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Silicon Nanowires for Intracellular Optical Interrogation with Sub-Cellular Resolution
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 825489
DO 10.1101/825489
A1 Menahem Y. Rotenberg
A1 Benayahu Elbaz
A1 Vishnu Nair
A1 Erik Schaumann
A1 Naomi Yamamoto
A1 Laura Matino
A1 Francesca Santoro
A1 Bozhi Tian
YR 2019
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/10/31/825489.abstract
AB Current techniques for intracellular electrical interrogation are substrate bound and are technically demanding, or lack high spatial resolution. In this work, we use silicon nanowires, which are spontaneously internalized by many cell types, to achieve photo-stimulation with sub-cellular resolution. Myofibroblasts loaded with silicon nanowires remain viable and can undergo cell division. Stimulation of silicon nanowires at separate intracellular locations results in local calcium fluxes. We also show that nanowire-containing myofibroblasts can electrically couple to cardiomyocytes in co-culture and that photo-stimulation of the nanowires increases the spontaneous activation rate in neighboring cardiomyocytes. Finally, we demonstrate that this methodology can be extended to the interrogation of signaling in neuron–glia interactions using nanowire-containing oligodendrocytes.