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Muscular Thin Films for Label-Free Mapping of Excitation Propagation in Cardiac Tissue

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Abstract

Muscular thin films (MTFs), have already found a variety of applications in cardiac tissue engineering and in building of lab-on-a-chip systems. Here we present a novel approach to label-free mapping of excitation waves in the cardiomyocyte cell cultures with the use of MTFs. Neonatal rat ventricular cardiomyocytes were cultured on polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) thin films and observed by means of off-axis illumination. Inflexions of the membrane created by the contraction of cardiomyocytes led to formation of patterns of bright and dark areas on the surface of the membrane. These patterns were recorded and analyzed for the monitoring of the contraction propagation. The method was compared with a standard optical mapping technique based on the use of a Ca2+-sensitive fluorescent dye. A good consistency of the results obtained by these two methods was demonstrated. The proposed method is non-toxic and might be of particular interest for the purpose of continuous monitoring in test systems based on human induced pluripotent stem cells.

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Abbreviations

HiPSC:

Human induced pluripotent stem cells

iPSC:

Induced pluripotent stem cells

MEAs:

Multi-electrode arrays

MEMs:

Microelectromechanical systems

MTFs:

Muscular thin films

PDMS:

Polydimethylsiloxane

SEM:

Scanning electron microscopy

AFM:

Atomic-force microscopy

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Acknowledgments

This research work was partially supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research grant 16-34-60225 and by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation Grant (state task) 6.9906.2017/BCh. Authors are grateful to the Center for collective use of unique scientific equipment in the field of nanotechnology of Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and personally to Dr. Negrov D.V. for the preparation of micro-patterned molds used in this research.

Author Contributions

VAB, VSG, KGG and KIA designed the experiments. VAB &VSG performed the experiments under the direction of KGG; VAB, VSG, KGG and KIA analyzed the data and contributed to discussion. VAB, VSG, KGG and KIA wrote and edited the manuscript.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Biophysics of Excitable Systems, Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, 9 Institutskiy Per., Dolgoprudny, Moscow Region, Russian Federation, 141701

    Viktor A. Balashov, Vasily S. Gorbunov, Konstantin G. Guria & Konstantin I. Agladze

  2. Laboratory of Functional Microscopy of Biostructures, Institute of Theoretical and Experimental Biophysics, Russian Academy of Sciences, 3 Institutskaya Str., Pushchino, Moscow Region, Russian Federation, 142290

    Viktor A. Balashov

  3. M.F. Vladimirsky Moscow Regional Research and Clinical Institute, 61/2, Schepkina Str., Moscow, Russian Federation, 129110

    Konstantin I. Agladze

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  1. Viktor A. Balashov
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  2. Vasily S. Gorbunov
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  3. Konstantin G. Guria
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  4. Konstantin I. Agladze
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Correspondence to Konstantin G. Guria.

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Electronic supplementary material

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S1 Video 1: Label-free monitoring of excitation wave propagation in a cell culture seeded on a thin film: A – raw data; B – contrast enhanced video. (AVI 15295 kb)

S2 Video 2: Label-free monitoring of spiral wave in an isotropic cardiac culture interacting with a circular wave: A – raw data; B – contrast enhanced video. (AVI 6502 kb)

S3 Video 3: Successive mapping of the same sample by two different methods: A – Ca2+-sensitive fluorescent mapping; B – label-free mapping. (AVI 21,065 kb)

S4 Video 4: Label-free monitoring of excitation waves performed on GoPro camera: A – raw data; B – contrast enhanced video. (AVI 6776 kb)

S5 Video 5: A spiral wave in anisotropic cardiac culture observed with the label-free method: A – raw data; B – contrast enhanced video. (AVI 10,710 kb)

10439_2020_2513_MOESM6_ESM.tif

Supplementary Figure 1. Activation maps of spiral waves imaged by label-free optical mapping. (a) Activation map of the spiral wave in isotropic cardiomyocyte culture interacting with the plane wave. (b) - Activation map of the anisotropic contraction spiral wave in the patterned cardiac monolayer. Scale bars – 3 mm. (TIFF 1207 kb)

10439_2020_2513_MOESM7_ESM.tif

Supplementary Figure 2. Conduction velocities for the samples cultured on membranes with different thicknesses. (TIFF 93 kb)

10439_2020_2513_MOESM8_ESM.tif

Supplementary Figure 3. Isochrones of excitation wave propagation in cardiac culture imaged by label-free method. (a) – Wave propagation without lidocaine. (b) – Wave propagation after treatment with 2 mM lidocaine. Time interval between isochrones is equal to 30 ms. Scale bar – 2 mm. (TIFF 259 kb)

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Balashov, V.A., Gorbunov, V.S., Guria, K.G. et al. Muscular Thin Films for Label-Free Mapping of Excitation Propagation in Cardiac Tissue. Ann Biomed Eng 48, 2425–2437 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10439-020-02513-0

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