Electrosprays and electrospinning are two interrelated physical phenomena which have been investigated for well over a century. Their similarity is based upon the primary driving mechanism; namely, the applied electric field. However, they have a fundamental difference that distinguishes one from the other: the former generates droplets while the latter forms continuous fibres. These two processing routes have been extensively researched in many areas. Within the realm of life sciences, these routes have ranged from novel bioanalytical approaches (DNA and biomolecules) to tissue engineering by the formation of scaffolds, which mimic extracellular matrices. Only lately have these methods been explored for the direct process handling of living cells…
Tag: <span>bio-electrospray</span>
Controlled cell deposition by way of micrometer-sized jets are increasingly becoming a fiercely pursued area of research. We recently uncovered the ability to jet living cells using one such jetting methodology, now referred to as bio-electrosprays. This technique has never been explored for processing living cells until now. Electrosprays charge media within a needle, subsequently imposing an external electric field to assist in drawing the media into a micro-jet. The resulting instabilities assist in jet break-up, forming cell-bearing droplets. These droplets containing viable cells could be deposited onto a wide variety of biological and non-biological substrates. In this article, we report our developmental studies into this jet approach with a view to the successful handling and deposition of primary neonatal cardiac myocytes…