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Researchers at the University of Tokyo have developed a flexible sheet-type sensor that allows noninvasive measurement of cellular oxygen metabolism. The group succeeded in sensitive and noninvasive measurement of small oxygen consumption just by placing the sensor on cultivated cells or sliced sections of three dimensional tissues.

Although evaluation of cellular quality and activity is important in the field of drug development and regenerative medicine, conventional cellular analysis methods tend to hurt or modify the measured cells.　As a result, researchers have been searching for sensors that allow noninvasive measurement of cultivated cells and that can be easily removed after measurement.

The research group, comprising Associate Professor Takanori Ichiki at the Graduate School of Engineering, the University of Tokyo and Nikon, has developed a flexible sheet-type sensor that allows sensitive and noninvasive measurement of cellular metabolism of cultivated cells or sliced tissues and can easily be removed after use.　The sensor comprises a flexible and transparent polymer sheet having a number of small holes, called as microchambers, whose diameter is as fine as that of hair. On the bottom of each hole, a thin sensing layer containing a phosphorescent metal complex shows a phosphorescence emission response dependent on the oxygen concentration.

“The combined use of the sensor and an automated optical measurement system to monitor the phosphorescence enabled high-throughput sensing of cellular oxygen consumption at 100 points per minute. We successfully monitored the oxygen metabolism of cancer cells on a Petri dish, and furthermore, demonstrated the mapping of oxygen consumption rate of rat brain slices,”　says Associate Professor Ichiki. He continues, “This sensor sheet is suitable for mass production and we expect will have widespread applications in drug discovery and in quality control of cultivated cells for regenerative medicine.”