Fabrication and Characterization of Micropatterned Living Cells

Recent progress in understanding molecular mechanism of cell adhesion has prompted researches for designing interfaces to regulate cell adhesion in μm scale. Such cellular micropatterning has been extensively attempted by a number of research groups, since the spatial control of cellular adhesion and growth is a critical issue in many areas of biotechnology such as tissue engineering, cell-based bioanalysis and bioelectronics. We report herein our recent results on 1) the development of techniques for cellular micropatterning and 2) the characterization of the functions of micropatterned cells and cellular networks. The well-known “microcontact-printing” andthe newly developed “electrochemical lithography” were applied to prepare the single-cell alignments. The cellular activity was found to be regulated by the cell shape. The patterned cardiomyocytes connected each other via gap junctions and served as a pharmacological model of cardiac tissue.