Opto-magnetic capture of individual cells based on visual phenotypes
- Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital, Canada
Abstract
The ability to isolate rare live cells within a heterogeneous population based solely on visual criteria remains technically challenging, due largely to limitations imposed by existing sorting technologies. Here we present a new method that permits labeling cells of interest by attaching streptavidin-coated magnetic beads to their membranes using the lasers of a confocal microscope. A simple magnet allows highly-specific isolation of the labeled cells, which then remain viable and proliferate normally. As proof of principle, we tagged, isolated, and expanded individual cells based on three biologically-relevant visual characteristics: i) presence of multiple nuclei, ii) accumulation of lipid vesicles, and iii) ability to resolve ionizing radiation-induced DNA damage foci. Our method constitutes a rapid, efficient, and cost-effective approach for isolation and subsequent characterization of rare cells based on observable traits such as movement, shape, or location, which in turn can generate novel mechanistic insights into important biological processes.
Data availability
All data generated or analysed during this study are included in the manuscript and supporting files
Article and author information
Author details
Jean François Lemay
Santiago Costantino
Funding
Canadian Institutes of Health Research
- El Bachir Affar
- Elliot Drobetsky
- Hugo Wurtele
Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
- El Bachir Affar
- Elliot Drobetsky
- Hugo Wurtele
- Santiago Costantino
Genome Canada
- Santiago Costantino
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Copyright
© 2019, Binan et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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Opto-magnetic capture of individual cells based on visual phenotypes
eLife 8:e45239.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.45239
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