Disposable Polymeric Nanostructured Plasmonic Biosensors for Cell Culture Adhesion Monitoring.

Over the last years, optical biosensors based on plasmonic nanomaterials have gained great scientific interest due to their unquestionable advantages compared to other biosensing technologies. They can achieve sensitive, direct, and label-free analysis with exceptional potential for multiplexing and miniaturization. Recently, it has been demonstrated the potential of using optical discs as high throughput nanotemplates for the development of plasmonic biosensors in a cost-effective way. This work is a pilot study focused on the development of an integrated plasmonic biosensor for the monitoring of cell adhesion and growth of human retinal pigmented cell line (ARPE-19) under different media conditions (0 and 2% of FBS). We observed an increase of the plasmonic band displacement under 2% FBS compared to 0% conditions over time (1, 3, and 5 h). These preliminary results show that the proposed plasmonic biosensing approach is a direct, non-destructive, and real-time tool that could be employed in the study of living cells behavior and culture conditions. Furthermore, this setup could assess the viability of the cells and their growth over time with low variability between the technical replicates improving the experimental replicability.

Introduction

Monitoring cell adhesion and growth is of crucial importance for a wide range of applications involved in drug screening, cytotoxicity, and cytocompatibility studies. Acquiring accurate information about of the growing state and responsiveness to a treatment of a cell system in real-time is still a challenge. Furthermore, improving accuracy of cell seeding and adhesion can reduce the variability intra- and inter-experiments (Van Kooten et al., 1997; Khalili and Ahmad, 2015; Acharya and Yap, 2016). Although the cell adhesion to a surface is a complex process, in terms of morphology, it can be described as a change from spheroids to a biaxial extension in which there is an increase of focal adhesion sites between the substrate and actin cytoskeleton (Khalili and Ahmad, 2015; Zhang et al., 2019). As a consequence of this increase of focal adhesion sites, the surface contact area between the cell and the substrate increases during the cell adhesion (Gallant et al., 2005). Between the different techniques to evaluate or assess cell adhesion, fluorescent and confocal microscopy are the gold standards (Braut-Boucher et al., 1995; Drey et al., 2013; Gomes et al., 2018). However, these techniques usually require cell labelling that can potentially interfere with the properties of the membrane (Robson et al., 2018). They also involve post-detection analysis, which decreases the potential for real-time monitoring of the kinetic of the adhesion process (Borile et al., 2019). On the other hand, multi-modal imaging based on harmonics generation is an optical technique capable to evaluate cell adhesion in a label-free manner; however, it requires complex and bulky instrumentation (Mazumder et al., 2019).

In the last years, plasmonic biosensors have been designed and developed as a new technique for cell adhesion study with the potential to allow non-invasive, direct and label-free real-time monitoring (Zeidan et al., 2015). The working principle of plasmonic biosensors is related to the evanescent wave detection principle, which allows the sensitive detection of superficial interactions (Schasfoort, 2017). As a result, it is highly relevant to monitor the changes in cell adhesion due to the increase of surface contact area. As has been widely documented (Lopez et al., 2017; Špačková et al., 2018), plasmonic biosensors based on nanostructured materials offer some advantages compared to those developed on thin films. These advantages are mainly related to an enhanced surface sensitivity (Špačková et al., 2018); and the potential to detect the surface interactions using simple optical arrays based on transmission/reflectance detection schemes instead of bulky and complex coupling methods (i.e., those based on attenuated total internal reflection by prism coupling) (Lopez et al., 2017). There have been described different approaches of plasmonic biosensors based on nanostructured materials for cell monitoring in the last years (Borile et al., 2019; Chang et al., 2019; Hou et al., 2019; Solis-Tinoco et al., 2019; Zhang et al., 2019); however, most of them involve a fabrication by complex lithographic methods and, as a result, lack of batch-to-batch reproducibility analysis of the plasmonic performance of the sensors.

To overcome the described limitations, in the present pilot study, we describe a highly reproducible, lithography-free and cost-effective optical biosensor with high potential for cell proliferation monitoring based on plasmonic nanocrystals with enhanced surface sensitivity (Lopez-Muñoz et al., 2021). Figure 1 shows a schematic representation of the plasmonic nanocrystals-based biosensor for monitoring cellular adhesion. The plasmonic nanocrystals employ industrially produced Blu-ray optical discs as polymeric nanotemplates. Blu-ray optical discs are manufactured on polycarbonate by thermal nanoimprint (Nishikawa and Fujita, 2015). Polycarbonate allows efficient deposition of thin gold films without an adhesion layer (i.e., chromium, titanium) that can negatively affect the plasmonic performance by damping effects (López-Muñoz et al., 2018). We developed a microfluidic device with an integrated trench filter to promote cell seeding in the sensor surface (Dimov et al., 2011; Yang et al., 2019). The device design uses patterned microfluidics in medical-grade double-sided adhesive tape. The integrated sensors were optically characterized under transverse-magnetic (TM) polarized white light in a reflectance detection scheme to evaluate their bulk sensitivity. Later, to perform cell adhesion monitoring, plasmonic nanocrystals were functionalized with poly-L-lysine (PLL), a commonly used coating agent to promote cell adhesion (Mazia et al., 1975; Lu et al., 2012). Finally, retinal pigmented cells under different media conditions (0 and 2% FBS) were cultured in the microfluidic device, and the plasmonic band position; monitored over 5 h after seeding.

FIGURE 1

Schematic representation of a high throughput plasmonic nanocrystals-based biosensing platform for monitoring cellular proliferation.

We observed an increase of the plasmonic band displacement under 2% FBS compared to 0% conditions over time, indicating an enhancement in adhesion of the cells with 2% FBS. The results obtained by the proposed plasmonic biosensors are in good agreement with those obtained by fluorescence microscopy and immunostaining (1, 3, and 5 h) by cell seeding in the gold sensing area with enhanced cell proliferation and metabolic activity in cell growth media with 2% FBS. These results show that the proposed plasmonic biosensing approach based on industrially produced Blu-ray discs has high potential to be a direct, non-destructive, and real-time tool for the study of living cells’ behavior and culture conditions.

Materials and Methods

Fabrication and Integration of the Plasmonic Nanocrystals Chip

Plasmonic nanocrystals based on Blu-ray optical discs were fabricated according to López Muñoz (2021). For the obtention of polymeric disposable nanotemplates, single-layer Blu-ray discs (43743, Verbatim, Taipei, Taiwan) were used after removing their protective and reflective films. The protective and reflective films were removed by cutting the disc in individual chips (size 5.6 cm2) and then by immersing it in a hydrochloric acid solution (2 M) overnight. The polycarbonate nanotemplates were rinsed with deionized water and nitrogen dried. The sensing area (3 mm diameter); were covered with a patterned adhesive vinyl stencil sheet (250 µm) used as an evaporation mask and placed in a vacuum deposition system (Univex 450B, Oerlikon Leybold, Cologne, Germany). A 70 nm gold layer was deposited by resistive thermal deposition (1 Å/s).

The microfluidic system for cell seeding and biodetection in flow consist of a single channel patterned in a 140 µm thick double-sided medical grade adhesive tape sheet (Mcs-foil-008, Microfluidic ChipShop GmbH, Jena, Germany). The proposed design integrates a trench filter located around the plasmonic sensing area for gravity-driven sedimentation and separation of cells from culture media. The dimensions for the trench filter design (10 mm length, 4 mm width, and 1 mm height); were selected according to a previous report from Dimov (2011). The trench filter cavity was patterned in a 1 mm thickness PMMA lid by computer numerical control (CNC) laser cutter and bonded to the plasmonic biosensor using double-sided adhesive tape.

Surface Functionalization of Plasmonic Nanocrystals

Sensor chips were cleaned and activated for surface functionalization by performing consecutive rinsing with 100 mM HCl, ethanol, and deionized water, drying with nitrogen, and placing them in a UV ozone generator (ProCleaner, BioForce Nanoscience, Virginia Beach, VA, United States) for 20 min. The cleaned and activated chips were functionalized with poly-L-lysine (PLL) (P2636, Sigma-Aldrich, Burlington, MA, United States) 0.1 mg/ml solution for 20 min to promote the adhesion of retinal cells. Later, sensor chips were rinsed with deionized water and nitrogen dried. A polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) lid with the connection ports for the fluidic tubing was employed as a cover. The microfluidic path was previously treated before bonding to the plasmonic biosensor with a 1 mg/ml solution of Poly(L-lysine)-graft-poly(ethylene glycol) copolymer (PLL-PEG, MW∼70000 g/mol, SuSos AG, Dübendorf, Switzerland) as cell repellent (Gabi et al., 2010) to promote cell adhesion selectively in the PLL functionalized biosensor surface.

Experimental Optical Setup and Plasmonic Monitoring

Reflectance measurements were performed at an incident angle of 40° under TM-polarized broadband light source (SLS201L, Thorlabs, Bergkirchen, Germany). The incident excitation plane was perpendicularly aligned to the nanograting direction. The reflected light was collected and fiber-coupled to a compact charge-coupled-device (CCD) spectrometer (Exemplar UV-NIR, BWTek, Lübeck, Germany). Reflectance spectra were acquired with an integration time of 1 ms and and an average of 50 spectra. Changes in the resonance peak position (λSPR) were tracked via peak analysis using Origin 2018 (OriginPro, OriginLab Co., Northampton, MA, United States) and finally processed with GraphPad Prism (GraphPad Software Inc., San Diego, CA, United States). To determine the bulk sensitivity of the bared plasmonic sensors, reflectivity spectra were collected in water (1.333 RIU) and HCl solutions in water (ranging between 1.336 and 1.354 RIU).

For cell adhesion monitoring, the reflectance spectra were tracked for 300 min after cell seeding on the biosensor. As a first step, basal Dulbecco’s Modified Eagle Medium (DMEM) cell culture media (with 0% FBS or 2% FBS) flowed over the PLL functionalized biosensor using a peristaltic pump (ISM 920, Cole-Parmer GmbH, Wertheim, Germany) at 50 μl/min for 10 min, as the baseline. Later, cells in a concentration of 2 × 105 cells/ml in 500 μL of cell culture media with 0% FBS and 2% FBS flowed through the microfluidic channel at 50 μl/min for 10 min. Finally, the peristaltic pump was stopped, and the reflectance spectra were acquired every 20 min for the first 1 h; and every 30 min for the rest 4 h.

Cell Line

The cells employed for this study were healthy immortalized human retinal pigment epithelia (RPE) cells purchased from ATCC® ARPE-19 (CRL-2302™, Manassas, VI, United States). They were kept in DMEM:F12 Medium (ATCC 30-2006) supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum (FBS; ATCC 30-2020). For each experiment, the cells were seeded at a density of 1.6 × 104/cm2 and cultured at 37°C, 5% CO2.

Live/Dead Staining

For each test, ethidium homodimer-1 (2 μM) (L3224, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Waltham, MA, United States) and calcein-AM (4 μM) were added to PBS and mixed. Afterwards, the plate was incubated for 30 min and rinsed with PBS three times. The cells were observed under fluorescence microscopy.

Fluorescence Staining

Cells were fixed in a 10% formalin solution for 10 min, washed with PBS, and permeabilized with Triton X-100 0.1% in PBS for 10 min. Then, cells were then incubated with rhodamine-phalloidin in Triton X-100 0.3%, donkey serum 3%, PBS for 2 h. Nuclei were stained with 1 µM DAPI for 10 min.

MTS and AlamarBlue

Cell metabolism was assessed using the CellTiter 96® AQueous One Solution Cell Proliferation Assay (G3582, Promega, AM, Dübendorf, Switzerland). Briefly, at day 1 and day 3, the supernatant was removed, and cells were washed twice with PBS. After that, 100 μl of fresh medium plus 20 μl of MTS was added and incubated for 1, 3, and 5 h. The absorbance was recorded at 490 nm. Cell viability was measured by AlamarBlue™ Cell Viability Reagent (DAL1025, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Barcelona, Spain). 30 min after cells were seeded, the supernatant was removed, and cells were washed twice with PBS. After that, 90 μl of fresh medium plus 10 μl of AlamarBlue™ reagent were added for 1, 3, and 5 h. The fluorescence signal was recorded using Ex (530 nm)/Em (590 nm).

Results and Discussion

Characterization of the Nanoplasmonic Sensor

As mentioned previously, plasmonic nanocrystals were fabricated using gold-capped polycarbonate templates obtained from commercial Blu-ray optical discs without the need of adhesion layers that can diminish the plasmon-exciton coupling by increased Ohmic plasmon losses (López-Muñoz et al., 2018). The scanning electron microscopy (SEM) image in Figure 2A demonstrate the presence of high-ordered 70 nm gold-capped nanostructures. Figure 2B shows a plasmonic biosensor with integrated microfluidics, including the trench filter. The integrated plasmonic biosensors were first characterized using the reflectance experimental set-up shown in Figure 2C. Furthermore, Figures 2D,E show the plasmonic band displacement and the calibration curve, correspondingly; obtained by flowing different HCl solutions over the sensing areas, achieving a bulk refractive index sensitivity of 332.17 ± 0.71 nm/RIU in good agreement with the value previously reported by López-Muñoz (2021). The obtained bulk sensitivity value is highly competitive and in the same order as those previously reported by engineered plasmonic nanostructures for cell adhesion monitoring (Borile et al., 2019; Chang et al., 2019; Hou et al., 2019; Solis-Tinoco et al., 2019; Zhang et al., 2019). The LOD of the biosensing experimental set-up was calculated as previously reported (López-Muñoz et al., 2017), the estimated value is near 3.43 × 10−4 RIU (see Supplementary Figure S2). Although the presented plasmonic nanocrystals have fixed structural dimensions (height and period), they don’t require additional lithographic steps. They are highly reproducible batch-to-batch with an average coefficient of variation below 1% in centroid and full width at half maximum (FWHM) in the plasmonic band (see Supplementary Figure S1) (Lopez-Muñoz et al., 2021). As a result, the proposed plasmonic biosensors are highly attractive for cell adhesion study (see Table 1). Furthermore, it represents a powerful approach considering their reduced fabrication costs compared to previously proposed plasmonic biosensors for cell analysis. These sensors can integrate multiple functionalities to develop comprehensive biosensing platforms with the proposed microfluidics. The detection scheme offers extra miniaturization capabilities for future integration with inline fluorescence/confocal microscopy and an incubation chamber to achieve a reliable biological response. Finally, the addition of an automated monitoring system could allow tracking adhesion kinetics with high time resolution (in the order of seconds) for long culture time (days or more) that could help to detect phenotypical changes in the cells.

FIGURE 2

Fabrication and characterization of the 1D plasmonic nanocrystals-based biosensor. (A) Scanning electron microscopy of the fabricated plasmonic nanocrystals. (B) Image of the integrated plasmonic biosensor including the filter trench (rectangular cavity) for the gravity-driven cell sedimentation and separation from the cell culture media. (C) Experimental set-up including the optical detection scheme and the microfluidic system. The insert shows the microfluidic pattern of the integrated sensor. (D) Variation of the reflectance spectra of the plasmonic nanocrystals under different refractive index HCl solutions. (E) Calibration curves and bulk sensitivity reproducibility between the two sensing areas for the proposed plasmonic sensor (n = 2).

TABLE 1

Comparison of different nanostructured plasmonic biosensors for cell adhesion/confluency monitoring.

Type of nanostructure	Fabrication method	Bulk sensitivity
Aluminium nanopyramids (Zhang et al., 2019)	Soft nanoimprint lithography	Up to 475 nm/RIU
Gold nanopillars (Solis-Tinoco et al., 2019)	Shadow sphere lithography	Up to 206 nm/RIU
Gold nanodots (Chang et al., 2019)	UV nanoimprint lithography	≈300 nm/RIU
Gold nanogratings (Borile et al., 2019)	Laser interference lithography	300°/RIU
Aluminium nanoslits (Hou et al., 2019)	Thermal nanoimprint	Up to 471 nm/RIU+
Gold nanocrystals*	Blu-ray discs (thermal nanoimprint)	≈330 nm/RIU

+(Lee et al., 2017), *this article.

Cell Adhesion Monitoring by the Plasmonic Biosensor

To evaluate the cell adhesion monitoring by the plasmonic biosensors, we seeded RPE cells with culture media supplemented with 2% and without FBS (0%) that represent the optimal and non-optimal cell culture growth, respectively. We observed a limited plasmonic band displacement overtime for the cells seeded with cell culture media without FBS (0% FBS), indicating a minimal adhesion of the cells (Figure 3A). On the other hand, the cells seeded with cell culture media supplemented with FBS (2%) showed a high plasmonic band displacement and a decrease in deep of the plasmonic band (Figure 3B). The phenomena can be correlated with the spreading of the cells over the biosensor surface, increasing the surface contact area, and considering RPE cells present a weak optical absorption at 600–700 nm wavelength (Arnault et al., 2013). We observed the plasmonic band displacement (∆λ) overtime from 0 to 5 h after cell seeding with and without FBS (Figure 3C). Basal cell culture media (DMEM without FBS) was used as a control sample and showed a limited plasmon band displacement over time with a ∆λmax ≈ 0.2 nm which can be related to unspecific absorption of components of the cell culture media (Zhang et al., 2021). The cells seeded with culture media without FBS (0% FBS) showed a slightly higher plasmonic band displacement in comparison to the control sample, with a ∆λmax ≈ 0.3 nm which can correlate to a limited spreading of the cells in the surface of the sensor. On the other hand, the cells seeded with culture media supplemented with FBS (2% FBS) shown a significative plasmonic band displacement over time, reaching a ∆λmax ≈ 1.2 nm at 5 h. We observed statistically significant differences between the different conditions evaluated with a 4-fold increase in ∆λmax with cells seeded with cell culture media supplemented with 2% FBS (Figure 3D). These results showed an increment of cell spreading over the gold biosensing surface with 2% FBS supplementation demonstrating that the plasmonic biosensor can detect changes in cell adhesion.

FIGURE 3

Cell confluency monitoring by 1D plasmonic nanocrystals. Reflectance spectra evolution over time from cells in cell culture media + (A) 0% FBS and (B) 2% FBS. (C) Experimental plasmonic band displacement (Δλ) over time observed from cell insertion to the microfluidic channel from 0 to 5 h on the gold nanograting-based biosensor (n = 2). The plot shows the induced spectral resonance shift after the initial position of the plasmonic band after cell-free culture media flow as time 0 and the subsequent flow of the cells over the biosensors. The plot also shows the plasmonic band displacement induced by the cell culture media as control sample. (D) Maximum plasmonic band displacement (Δλmax) comparison of the evaluated conditions and their corresponding statistical analysis (n = 2).

Cell Confluency and Morphology by Cytoskeleton Staining

We next sought to confirm the results obtained with the proposed biosensor with a fluorescence staining monitoring the cell morphology using and cytoskeleton assay. Using fluorescence microscopy, we observed cell adherence to the biosensor surface in both 0 and 2% FBS conditions. After 5 h, the cells cultured in 2% of FBS present the intracellular pigment compared to the cell’s growth without FBS, hallmark of the retinal cells (red arrows, Figure 4). As expected, the supplementation of culture media with FBS improved cell proliferation and adhesion. These data demonstrated that the proposed biosensor can detect change in cell adhesion which is an indirect measure of healthy state of the cells.

FIGURE 4

Fluorescence microscopy images of ARPE-19 cell cultures. Cytoskeleton was marked using phalloidin staining and nuclei were marked using DAPI. Comparison of cell proliferation on the gold sensor with cells cultured with FBS 2% and without FBS. Cell adherence was monitored for 5 h; images were acquired at 1, 3, and 5 h.

Cell Viability and Metabolism

A live/dead assay based on calcein staining was performed to evaluate the viability of ARPE-19 cells. Calcein is a non-fluorescent compound that enters cells and is converted to green fluorescent calcein by metabolically active cells (Braut-Boucher et al., 1995). Figure 5A shows that the gold biosensors surface does not affect the viability of ARPE-19 cells after 5 h. To confirm these results, we employed two assays, the MTS and AlamarBlue™ assays, that confirm both the proliferation and metabolic state of the cells (Figure 5B). Figure 5C shows the increase in cell number and metabolism over time in cells seeded with culture media 2% FBS. On the contrary, the cells seeded with culture media without FBS show a stationary behaviour in their metabolism and viability over the 5 h. These results are in agreement with the fact that FBS supplementation improve cell viability and metabolism (Subbiahanadar Chelladurai et al., 2021). Furthermore, the plasmonic biosensor can accurately detect the cell adhesion and confluency by monitoring the free gold surface available. R-squared Pearson correlation values of 0.9637 and 0.9906 were estimated for MTS and AlamarBlue™, respectively, with the results obtained with biosensor devices, respectively. These results show the high correlation between the results obtained using the plasmonic sensor and the immunostaining assays.

FIGURE 5

Cell viability and metabolic activity assays. (A) Live/dead images of ARPE-19 cell culture with FBS 2% from fluorescence microscopy. Cell growth was monitored for 5 h, images were acquired at 1, 3 and 5 h. (B) Correlation between cell number and MTS and AlamarBlue™ assays. (C) Proliferation assay with MTS and AlamarBlue™ of ARPE-19 cell culture with FBS 2 and 0%. Data was recorded at 1, 3, and 5 h.

Conclusion

This work has described the fabrication and integration of an integrated plasmonic biosensor for cell adhesion/confluency study. The proposed biosensor is based on polymeric nanotemplates obtained by commercially available Blu-ray optical discs to fabricate plasmonic nanocrystals. The proposed nanotemplates rid lithographic processes and allow the achievement of reproducible sensors for cell adhesion/confluency monitoring in contrast to previous reported plasmonic biosensors for the same purpose. The preliminary results showed that the present nanostructured plasmonic biosensors allowed us to monitor the cell adhesion changes of retinal cells overtime related to the supplementation of cell culture media with or without FBS with a good correlation between the trend obtained by the plasmonic sensor, and the MTS and AlamarBlue™ immunostaining assays. The present nanostructured plasmonic biosensor represent a potential tool to study and monitor cell culture. Due to its high versatility and straightforward potential integration, the presented plasmonic biosensor is an exciting candidate to develop sensing platforms for cell cultures. More research is required, mainly focused on integrating multiple functionalities in the sensor chip with a miniaturized platform that allows their use in conventional incubation chambers and inline coupling with fluorescence/confocal microscopy for a reliable biological response.