Scientists in the UK and Japan have developed a microarray platform that allows polymers to be screened for their adhesion to cells. Mark Bradley at the University of Edinburgh and co-workers used the system to screen large libraries of polymers in a single experiment.

Polymers have great potential for biological applications, said Bradley. However, it is not yet possible to predict how a polymer will interact with biological materials from its chemical structure. Traditional methods of polymer testing are slow and an effective high-throughput method for cellular adhesion could help address this, said Bradley. 

Bradley investigated surfaces onto which polymers could be printed in an array. The surface had to be unaltered by the solvent used to dissolve the polymers and, for successful cell adhesion studies, have low background cell binding. A thin film of agarose met both requirements. Bradley treated the polymer array with human renal cells and was able to measure cell adhesion levels.

Jari Yli-Kauhaluoma of University of Helsinki, Finland, welcomes this work. 'The microarrays provide a way to explore structure-property relationships between members of the polymer microarray and biological material in a convenient and straightforward fashion, thereby stimulating fast developments in this field,' he said.

Guilhem Tourniaire, who worked on the project, agrees. 'This methodology holds great potential in the development of new materials for various applications, such as tissue engineering and cell biology. The identification of new substrates with improved cellular binding could bring a new dimension to the field of reverse transfection microarrays by allowing a wider range of primary and immortalised cells to be studied,' said Tourniaire.  

Rebecca Gillan