Microfluidic Probe for Neural Organotypic Brain Tissue and Cell Perfusion

This chapter presents how the microfluidic probe (MFP) was used to perform selective localized perfusion of organotypic brain slice cultures to demonstrate the potential applications of open microfluidics in this field. To adapt the MFP for brain slice cultures, it was necessary to design an open top perfusion chamber with microscopy compatibility and integrate this chamber with the MFP technology. The chapter discusses the design of this perfusion chamber, the design and assembly of the MFPs used for this work, and the application of the experimental setup for microperfusion of organotypic brain slices and neuronal cell cultures. It also presents an extension of MFP technology into the field of neuroscience, with an emphasis on microperfusion of hippocampal organotypic brain slice cultures and dissociated neuronal cell cultures. The chapter also discusses examples of how the microperfusion technique was applied to other biological samples, such as dissociated neural cell cultures.