In my last post on this subject, I showed that cutting off permeability of pnc-Si chips inhibits vacuole formation in endothelial cells.  To do this, I seeded cells on the membrane side, allowed them to attach, inverted them onto a…

One of the hidden secrets of endothelial angiogenesis assays on Matrigel is that non-endothelial cell types also form 2D capillary-like structures (tubes) on those gels.  Motivated by this observation, I wanted to look at fibroblast behavior on pnc-Si transwells, specifically…

There’s been lots of discussion about “non-porous” membranes and the possibility that they are actually porous.  By “non-porous”, I mean that a TEM of that membrane doesn’t have obvious pores by pore processing/our eyes.  This could mean a couple things:…

The AIM of this experiment was to see the effect of surfaces modified with PEGs (Polyethylene glycol) to protein adsorption. The PEG that I used for the current study is MS-PEG8 (Methyl-PEG8-NHS) which is Amine reactive. Method: For the current…

I did a small experiment to demonstrate that a carbonized membrane would be stable in a harsh alkaline solution, such as KOH. I soaked a carbonized membrane and untreated membrane in %5 KOH at 40 C for an hour in…

Inspired by some recent literature that I have been reading, I decided to add an argon bombardment step after the amorphous silicon deposition step by applying a 50 W substrate bias. The idea is that point defects on the surface…

The other (see below) just-to-be-sure experiment I performed this week was to compare staining between 2 different live cell dyes.  I typically use calcein AM to stain live cells green.  This is a membrane-permeant dye which, once inside cells, is…

I recently started up another BBB co-cultures and I had a couple of leftover samples.  I decided to use one for a ‘just-to-be-sure’ experiment since I realized that I never did a calcein-Hoechst 33342 co-stain.  That is, I never used…

In prep for manuscript writing I came across a paper that says they’ve created a super efficient EO pump that uses extremely low voltages.  Their top flow rate (.125 mL/(min V cm2) ) is comparable to the flow rates I…

I designed new masks with different sized squares and slits in order to study how the aspect ratio of free-standing membranes would affect endothelial cells.  In this 1st experiment, I seeded bEnd at 50000 cells/cm2 and let them grow for…