Dextran adsorption onto red blood cells revisited: single cell quantification by laser tweezers combined with microfluidics

Kisung Lee; Evgeny Shirshin; Nataliya Rovnyagina; Francois Yaya; Zakaria Boujja; Alexander Priezzhev; Christian Wagner

doi:10.1364/BOE.9.002755

Dextran adsorption onto red blood cells revisited: single cell quantification by laser tweezers combined with microfluidics

Biomed Opt Express. 2018 May 22;9(6):2755-2764. doi: 10.1364/BOE.9.002755. eCollection 2018 Jun 1.

Authors

Kisung Lee^{1

2

3

4}, Evgeny Shirshin^{2

4}, Nataliya Rovnyagina², Francois Yaya^{1

5}, Zakaria Boujja^{1

6}, Alexander Priezzhev^{2

7}, Christian Wagner^{1

8}

Affiliations

¹ Experimental Physics, Saarland University, Saarbrücken, D-66041, Germany.
² Faculty of Physics, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow, 119991, Russia.
³ Curremtly with Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, Institute for Basic Science, Center for Soft and Living Matter, Ulsan, 44919, South Korea.
⁴ Co-first authors with equal contribution.
⁵ Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire de Physique, UMR 5588 CNRS and University Grenoble-Alpes, Saint Martin d'Hères Cedex, B.P. 87, 38402, France.
⁶ LaMCScI, University Mohamed V, Faculty of Sciences, Rabat, Morocco.
⁷ International Laser Center, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow, 119991, Russia.
⁸ Physics and Materials Science Research Unit, University of Luxembourg, L-1511, Luxembourg.

Abstract

The aggregation of red blood cells (RBC) is of importance for hemorheology, while its mechanism remains debatable. The key question is the role of the adsorption of macromolecules on RBC membranes, which may act as "bridges" between cells. It is especially important that dextran is considered to induce "bridge"-less aggregation due to the depletion forces. We revisit the dextran-RBC interaction on the single cell level using the laser tweezers combined with microfluidic technology and fluorescence microscopy. An immediate sorption of ~10⁴ molecules of 70 kDa dextran per cell was observed. During the incubation of RBC with dextran, a gradual tenfold increase of adsorption was found, accompanied by a moderate change in the RBC deformability. The obtained data demonstrate that dextran sorption and incubation-induced changes of the membrane properties must be considered when studying RBC aggregation in vitro.

Keywords: (020.7010) Laser trapping; (170.1530) Cell analysis; (170.2520) Fluorescence microscopy.