Papers by Keyword: Living Cells

Abstract: Insect has a highly sensitive and accurate discrimination capacity for sensing odorants in the environment, though its olfactory system is much simpler than mammalians. Insect olfactory receptor (OR) proteins play key roles in odor detection and discrimination. Unlike the complex olfactory signaling in mammalian, the insect ORs can be directly gated by odorants, and can function without the co-expression of downstream signaling molecules. Therefore, insect ORs hold great promise as detectors in a biosensor for detection of volatile chemicals. Several important OR genes in Drosophila, which respond to explosive vapor or related precursors such as PTEN and 2-ehtyl-hexanol, have been reported. The present work screened and selected OR genes which are sensitive to explosive vapor and related precursors by calcium imaging and electrophysiological techniques. Furthermore, a biomimetic odorant sensor which co-expresses these OR genes and a companion receptor Or83b in living cells is being constructed, in order to classify unknown volatile chemicals and detect specific types of illicit substances. This study provides an alternative way for the construction of odorant sensors, comparing to the traditional electronic noses which are not as sensitive and accurate as natural noses, and would promote the development and application of biomimetic odorant sensors in a range of applications such as security and environmental monitoring.

Abstract: We present a new bio-photonic method based on Raman spectroscopy able to characterize living cells in in-vitro cultures. The main advantages of this technology are: no labels or other contrast enhancers are required; provides real-time analysis; cells can be maintained in physiological conditions during the measurements; no cell-damage is induced during the measurements; it is rich in information about the biochemical composition of the cell. The results show that this spectroscopic method can be used to study the most important cellular functions involved in cell-biomaterial interactions, such as cell death, differentiation, de-differentiation and mineralization. The method offers the potential for studying cell-bioceramics interaction and reduce the need of animal testing until the final steps of proving efficacy prior to clinical trials.