Quantifying specific cell–polymer interactions using fluorescence correlation spectroscopy

Abstract

Evaluation of interactions between polymers and cells is very important in many biomedical applications, including tissue engineering, as polymer scaffolds represent the extracellular matrix in the body and provide cells with three-dimensional framework. Alginate was modified with a peptide with the sequence of arginine–glycine–aspartic acid (RGD) to prepare cell-interactive polymers, and specific interactions between mouse fibroblasts and RGD peptide-modified alginates were investigated using fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS). FCS was useful for determining cell–polymer interactions in a quantitative manner at nanomolar polymer concentrations, and the results were consistent with those obtained from the fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) technique. This approach of quantitatively determining interactions between cells and polymers could be useful for developing novel polymer scaffolds for tissue engineering, as well as for designing highly efficient drug delivery systems.