title: Microfluidic-Based Live-Cell Analysis of NK Cell Migration In Vitro.
abstract: Effector functions and cellular properties of natural killer (NK) cells are regulated by cellular and extracellular factors shaped by the microenvironments. NK cells express specific chemokine and non-chemokine receptors to aid preferential migrations or localizations in tissues. Good understanding of how NK-cell migratory properties are regulated in physiological and pathological microenvironments will provide further insights into the development of NK cell-based therapeutic approaches. In contrast to the commonly used conventional in vitro migration assays such as Trans-well assays that measure movements of a population of the migratory cells, microfluidic-based devices support live-cell imaging of cell migrations under a well-defined chemical gradient(s) at microscale. Subsequent analyses at single-cell level provide quantitative measurements of cell-migration parameters such as speed and Chemotactic Index, and permit distinguishing chemotaxis, chemokinesis, and chemo-repulsion. Our recent work established the use of a Y-shaped microfluidic device to study NK cell migrations in vitro. In this chapter, we described the detailed method of acquiring and analyzing NK cell migration in the microfluidic devices.
authors.affiliation: Department of Immunology, University of Manitoba, 417 Apotex Centre, 750 McDermot Avenue, Winnipeg, MB, Canada, R3E 0T5.
authors.forename: Saravanan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Nandagopal
authors.affiliation: Department of Immunology, University of Manitoba, 417 Apotex Centre, 750 McDermot Avenue, Winnipeg, MB, Canada, R3E 0T5.|Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, Canada.|Department of Biosystems Engineering, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, Canada.
authors.forename: Francis
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.affiliation: Department of Immunology, University of Manitoba, 417 Apotex Centre, 750 McDermot Avenue, Winnipeg, MB, Canada, R3E 0T5. sam.kung@umanitoba.ca.
authors.forename: Sam K P
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Kung
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002465:Cell Movement; D046508:Culture Techniques; D006801:Humans; D066298:In Vitro Techniques; D015979:Killer Cells, Lymphokine-Activated / Q000166:cytology*; D007694:Killer Cells, Natural / Q000166:cytology*; D008213:Lymphocyte Activation; D051379:Mice; D046210:Microfluidic Analytical Techniques / Q000295:instrumentation*
keywords: Bone marrow-derived dendritic cells; Chemo-repulsion; Chemotaxis; Microfluidic device; NK-DC crosstalk; Natural killer cell