Luke P. Lee (Advisor)

Most of current clinical diagnosis is based on observation and analysis on a large number of cells, which provides averaged or integrated information about the disease state. However, many diseases start from a small number of mutated or unhealthy cells while most other cells remain normal. In order to detect these precursors as early as possible, a high throughput single cell based detection method is required for the analysis of large number of cells from tissue samples. Here we report a microfluidic device where individual cells are encapsulated in nano-liter aqueous compartments...

Patch clamp technique has had a profound impact on electrophysiology, playing a crucial role in the characterization of cellular ion channels. Traditionally, the technique was accomplished with a glass pipette positioned by a micromanipulator under a microscope. Even though patch clamp technique has been improved, it is still laborious and requires precise micromanipulation of glass pipettes and skillful handling of the electrical sealing. In addition, the irreversible sealing between cell membranes and pipettes need a new pipette for every new experiment. Because of these...

The investigation of biological processes on the cellular level is becoming increasingly important for medical and bioengineering purposes. We have learned from genomics and proteomics that a vast amount of molecular information is integrated on the cell level. However, current technology is limited in the ability to assay cellular responses to stimuli in high throughput format. Specifically, a standardized platform to perform array experiments on the laboratory scale is needed to help scientists unravel the complexities of eukaryotic cellular behavior. To this end, we are developing...

The fact that cellular ion channels are effective drug targets, coupled with the laboriousness of traditional patch clamp techniques, has created a need for hi-throughput electrophysiology platforms. Patch clamp based drug screening technology has been recently implemented by using microfabricated patch clamp designs that replace the traditional patch pipette with a pore in a silicon substrate. While successful at high-throughput measurements of channel activity, current devices have yet to achieve high densities of patched cells per unit volume and rely on robotically operated...