9. Artificial Cells

Techniques of droplet generation and analysis were applied to synthetic biology to make artificial cells. These droplet cells enable reconstitute cellular machineries to mimic self-sustained cell cycle oscillations in vitro. In real cells that proliferate, as shown in the picture, a cell-cycle oscillator centered on cyclin-dependent kinase (Cdk1) and anaphasepromoting complex or cyclosome (APC/C) (top left) drives the alternations of (i) synthesis and degradation of securing (upper right), and (ii) a nucleus formation and nuclear envelope breaks down (lower bottom).

With an automatic droplet segmentation and tracking script, long-term time-lapse imaging was used to label and monitor each individual droplets (left bottom). It offers a high-throughput and low-cost method to measure three major types of biochemical assays in droplets from their digital, analog and morphological signals.

Anal. Chem., 2019, 91, 9813