Dynamics of Giant Vesicles and Their Application as Artificial Cell-based Sensor

Abstract

Cells have highly sensitive and selective sensing devices composed of lipid-protein complexes, and also sometimes work as highly functionalized sensors against foreign invaders, such as bacteria. Toward the construction of such sophisticated micrometer-sized sensors, giant vesicles have drawn much attention as a deformable cellular chassis. Giant vesicles comprise closed lipid bilayer membrane, the diameter of which is larger than 1 μm. The membrane proteins can be installed to the giant vesicle membrane and biomolecular devices can be encapsulated inside of giant vesicles. Here, we introduce the typical dynamics of giant vesicles and discuss about the significance of an array device of giant vesicles toward artificial cell-based sensors. To realize such an array device, we constructed a microfluidic device for size-selection and trapping of giant vesicles. The feature and further perspective of the current microfluidic device are described in this review.