title: Encapsulation of single cells on a microfluidic device integrating droplet generation with fluorescence-activated droplet sorting.
abstract: Encapsulation of single cells is a challenging task in droplet microfluidics due to the random compartmentalization of cells dictated by Poisson statistics. In this paper, a microfluidic device was developed to improve the single-cell encapsulation rate by integrating droplet generation with fluorescence-activated droplet sorting. After cells were loaded into aqueous droplets by hydrodynamic focusing, an on-flight fluorescence-activated sorting process was conducted to isolate droplets containing one cell. Encapsulation of fluorescent polystyrene beads was investigated to evaluate the developed method. A single-bead encapsulation rate of more than 98 % was achieved under the optimized conditions. Application to encapsulate single HeLa cells was further demonstrated with a single-cell encapsulation rate of 94.1 %, which is about 200 % higher than those obtained by random compartmentalization. We expect this new method to provide a useful platform for encapsulating single cells, facilitating the development of high-throughput cell-based assays.
authors: Department of Biomedical Engineering, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors: Liang
authors: L
authors: Wu
authors: Pu
authors: P
authors: Chen
authors: Yingsong
authors: Y
authors: Dong
authors: Xiaojun
authors: X
authors: Feng
authors: Bi-Feng
authors: BF
authors: Liu
mesh_terms: D002214:Capsules; D005434:Flow Cytometry / Q000295:instrumentation*; D006367:HeLa Cells; D006801:Humans; D057446:Hydrodynamics; D046210:Microfluidic Analytical Techniques / Q000295:instrumentation*; D011312:Pressure; D059010:Single-Cell Analysis; D018511:Systems Integration
chemical_list: D002214:Capsules