Nanomedicine: Optical Nanomanipulations of Malignant Cells: Controlled Cell Damage and Fusion (Small 11/2012)

The cover image shows the formation of a hybridoma cell from a human B cell (red-labeled nuclei) and a murine myeloma cell (blue-labeled nuclei). This fusion event between the two cells which are incubated with 20 nm gold nanospheres, is initiated by irradiation of the cells using five intense femtosecond pulses whose wavelength is tuned to match the plasmonic resonance of the nanospheres. A time sequence of fl uorescence images superimposed on phase contrast images shows in detail the fusion process, resulting in the formation of a hybridoma cell, which is used for the production of monoclonal antibodies. Combining specific gold nanospheres and resonant femtosecond pulses, the presented method for cell nanomanipulations is capable of mediating cell necrosis, apoptosis, and fusion simply by varying the number of pulses used for irradiating the tissue. For more information, please refer to the Full Paper “Optical Nanomanipulations of Malignant Cells: Controlled Cell Damage and Fusion” by D. Yelin and co-workers, beginning on page 1732.