Engineering solutions for biological studies of flow-exposed endothelial cells on orbital shakers

PLoS One. 2022 Jan 21;17(1):e0262044. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0262044. eCollection 2022.

Abstract

Shear stress is extremely important for endothelial cell (EC) function. The popularity of 6-well plates on orbital shakers to impose shear stress on ECs has increased among biologists due to their low cost and simplicity. One characteristic of such a platform is the heterogeneous flow profile within a well. While cells in the periphery are exposed to a laminar and high-velocity pulsatile flow that mimics physiological conditions, the flow in the center is disturbed and imposes low shear stress on the cells, which is characteristic of atheroprone regions. For studies where such heterogeneity is not desired, we present a simple cell-patterning technique to selectively prevent cell growth in the center of the well and facilitate the exclusive collection and analysis of cells in the periphery. This guarantees that cell phenotypes will not be influenced by secreted factors from cells exposed to other shear profiles nor that interesting results are obscured by mixing cells from different regions. We also present a multi-staining platform that compartmentalizes each well into 5 smaller independent regions: four at the periphery and one in the center. This is ideal for studies that aim to grow cells on the whole well surface, for comparison with previous work and minimal interference in the cell culture, but require screening of markers by immunostaining afterwards. It allows to compare different regions of the well, reduces antibody-related costs, and allows the exploration of multiple markers essential for high-content screening of cell response. By increasing the versatility of the 6-well plate on an orbital shaker system, we hope that these two solutions motivate biologists to pursue studies on EC mechanobiology and beyond.

MeSH terms

  • Antigens, CD / metabolism
  • Cadherins / metabolism
  • Cell Culture Techniques / instrumentation
  • Cell Culture Techniques / methods*
  • Coculture Techniques
  • Human Umbilical Vein Endothelial Cells / pathology
  • Humans
  • Hydrogels / chemistry
  • Muscle, Smooth, Vascular / cytology
  • Muscle, Smooth, Vascular / metabolism
  • Muscle, Smooth, Vascular / pathology
  • Polyethylene Glycols / chemistry
  • Shear Strength

Substances

  • Antigens, CD
  • Cadherins
  • Hydrogels
  • cadherin 5
  • Polyethylene Glycols

Grants and funding

This work was part of the Zurich Heart project from Hochschulmedizin Zürich and was funded by the Zurich Heart Grant and the ETHeart Initiative (ETH Zurich).The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.