A Chip Device for Single Membrane Channel Assays

A project in collaboration with Prof. Dr. Jan Behrends (University of Freiburg, Department of Physiology II)

The investigation of transport processes through cell membranes is of interest academically but also for research areas such as drug development. The current “gold standard” is the patch-clamp method, in which a part of a cell membrane, containing a channel, is contacted using a glass pipette. The channel acitivity is then recorded through an electrode within the glass pipette. One drawback of this technique is, however, that it is not suitable for high throughput measurement as needed e.g. for drug testing. To circumvent this problem the aim of our research is to develop a planar chip device with many assay locations, where experiments can be done in parallel. A simple prototype of this chip is shown in Figure 1. It is built on a glass substrate onto which the analysis electrodes are patterned. This chip is covered by a thick polymeric layer into which little cavities are processed at the electrode positions. Lipid bilayers are spanned over these cavities and membrane channels can be reconstituted within these membranes. Using a chip readout system the current through the channels can be measures and some examples of such measurements through alamethicin channels are shown in Figure 2.