TY  - JOUR
A1  - Sancho, Ana
A1  - Vandersmissen, Ine
A1  - Craps, Sander
A1  - Luttun, Aernout
A1  - Groll, Jürgen
T1  - A new strategy to measure intercellular adhesion forces in mature cell-cell contacts
JF  - Scientific Reports
N2  - Intercellular adhesion plays a major role in tissue development and homeostasis. Yet, technologies to measure mature cell-cell contacts are not available. We introduce a methodology based on fluidic probe force microscopy to assess cell-cell adhesion forces after formation of mature intercellular contacts in cell monolayers. With this method we quantify that L929 fibroblasts exhibit negligible cell-cell adhesion in monolayers whereas human endothelial cells from the umbilical artery (HUAECs) exert strong intercellular adhesion forces per cell. We use a new in vitro model based on the overexpression of Muscle Segment Homeobox 1 (MSX1) to induce Endothelial-to-Mesenchymal Transition (EndMT), a process involved in cardiovascular development and disease. We reveal how intercellular adhesion forces in monolayer decrease significantly at an early stage of EndMT and we show that cells undergo stiffening and flattening at this stage. This new biomechanical insight complements and expands the established standard biomolecular analyses. Our study thus introduces a novel tool for the assessment of mature intercellular adhesion forces in a physiological setting that will be of relevance to biological processes in developmental biology, tissue regeneration and diseases like cancer and fibrosis.
KW  - intercellular adhesion
KW  - mature cell-cell contacts
KW  - atomic force microscopy
KW  - biophysics
Y1  - 2017
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-170999
VL  - 7
IS  - 46152
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Schuster, Sarah
A1  - Krüger, Timothy
A1  - Subota, Ines
A1  - Thusek, Sina
A1  - Rotureau, Brice
A1  - Beilhack, Andreas
A1  - Engstler, Markus
T1  - Developmental adaptations of trypanosome motility to the tsetse fly host environments unravel a multifaceted in vivo microswimmer system
JF  - eLife
N2  - The highly motile and versatile protozoan pathogen Trypanosoma brucei undergoes a complex life cycle in the tsetse fly. Here we introduce the host insect as an expedient model environment for microswimmer research, as it allows examination of microbial motion within a diversified, secluded and yet microscopically tractable space. During their week-long journey through the different microenvironments of the fly´s interior organs, the incessantly swimming trypanosomes cross various barriers and confined surroundings, with concurrently occurring major changes of parasite cell architecture. Multicolour light sheet fluorescence microscopy provided information about tsetse tissue topology with unprecedented resolution and allowed the first 3D analysis of the infection process. High-speed fluorescence microscopy illuminated the versatile behaviour of trypanosome developmental stages, ranging from solitary motion and near-wall swimming to collective motility in synchronised swarms and in confinement. We correlate the microenvironments and trypanosome morphologies to high-speed motility data, which paves the way for cross-disciplinary microswimmer research in a naturally evolved environment.
KW  - none
KW  - tsetse fly
KW  - Trypanosoma
KW  - biophysics
KW  - microswimmer
KW  - sleeping sickness
KW  - structural biology
Y1  - 2017
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-158662
VL  - 6
ER  -