4D‐Printed Transformable Tube Array for High‐Throughput 3D Cell Culture and Histology. Issue 40 (31st August 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Yang, Chen; Luo, Jeffrey; Polunas, Marianne; Bosnjak, Nikola; Chueng, Sy‐Tsong Dean; Chadwick, Michelle; Sabaawy, Hatem E.; Chester, Shawn A.; Lee, Ki‐Bum; Lee, Howon
• Is Part Of: Advanced materials. Volume 32:Issue 40(2020)
• Page Start: n/a
• Page End: n/a
• Publication Date: 2020-08-31
• Subjects: 3D cell culture -- 4D printing -- high‐throughput/content screening -- parallel histology -- shape‐memory polymers; Materials -- Periodicals; Chemical vapor deposition -- Periodicals; 620.11
• DOI: 10.1002/adma.202004285
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0935-9648

Abstract

Abstract: 3D cell cultures are rapidly emerging as a promising tool to model various human physiologies and pathologies by closely recapitulating key characteristics and functions of in vivo microenvironment. While high‐throughput 3D culture is readily available using multi‐well plates, assessing the internal microstructure of 3D cell cultures still remains extremely slow because of the manual, laborious, and time‐consuming histological procedures. Here, a 4D‐printed transformable tube array (TTA) using a shape‐memory polymer that enables massively parallel histological analysis of 3D cultures is presented. The interconnected TTA can be programmed to be expanded by 3.6 times of its printed dimension to match the size of a multi‐well plate, with the ability to restore its original dimension for transferring all cultures to a histology cassette in order. Being compatible with microtome sectioning, the TTA allows for parallel histology processing for the entire samples cultured in a multi‐well plate. The test result with human neural progenitor cell spheroids suggests a remarkable reduction in histology processing time by an order of magnitude. High‐throughput analysis of 3D cultures enabled by this TTA has great potential to further accelerate innovations in various 3D culture applications such as high‐throughput/content screening, drug discovery, disease modeling, and personalized medicine. Abstract : A 4D‐printed transformable culture tube array (TTA) can directly transfer a large number of 3D culture models from a microwell plate to a histology cassette, enabling rapid and parallel histological analysis. A seamless workflow from cell culture to histological analysis is demonstrated with human neural progenitor cell (hNPC) spheroids cultured in the TTA.