Cell Volume Changes and Membrane Ruptures Induced by Hypotonic Electrolyte and Sugar Solutions

Bojan Božič; Špela Zemljič Jokhadar; Luka Kristanc; Gregor Gomišček

doi:10.3389/fphys.2020.582781

Cell Volume Changes and Membrane Ruptures Induced by Hypotonic Electrolyte and Sugar Solutions

Front Physiol. 2020 Dec 7:11:582781. doi: 10.3389/fphys.2020.582781. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Bojan Božič¹, Špela Zemljič Jokhadar^{1

2}, Luka Kristanc¹, Gregor Gomišček^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Biophysics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
² Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia.

Abstract

The cell volume changes induced by hypotonic electrolyte and sucrose solutions were studied in Chinese-hamster-ovary epithelial cells. The effects in the solutions with osmolarities between 32 and 315 mosM/L and distilled water were analyzed using bright-field and fluorescence confocal microscopy. The changes of the cell volume, accompanied by the detachment of cells, the formation of blebs, and the occurrence of almost spherical vesicle-like cells ("cell-vesicles"), showed significant differences in the long-time responses of the cells in the electrolyte solutions compared with the sucrose-containing solutions. A theoretical model based on different permeabilities of ions and sucrose molecules and on the action of Na⁺/K⁺-ATPase pumps is applied. It is consistent with the observed temporal behavior of the cells' volume and the occurrence of tension-induced membrane ruptures and explains lower long-time responses of the cells in the sucrose solutions.

Keywords: CHO cells; cell volume; hypotonic medium; osmotic effects; tension-induced rupture.