Development of a Microfluidic Platform to Enable the Study of Drug Effects on Caenorhabditis Elegans Embryos

Abstract

With advancements in microscopy and imaging, the research devoted to developing systems has increased. In particular, model systems like the embryo of Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) are under scrutiny due to their known cell lineage, their inexpensiveness, and the ease of growing them. Despite these advantages, a higher throughput method of isolation, permeabilization, and imaging for the purpose of future drug studies has not been developed. Although many studies have solved each of these tasks individually, they have not aimed to integrate them. The goal of this thesis, then, was to develop methods and procedures to accomplish all three goals within the same system. Using a newly designed microfluidic device and procedures like dissection and RNAi plate feeding, a system has successfully been developed. Preliminary drug experiments with the tumor suppressant drug actinomycin D were carried primarily to confirm the validity of the device, but also demonstrate the potential for the designed methods and procedures.