Micromechanical aspects of mesangial cells of the kidney

Chien Jung Huang, William Craelius, Carlos E. Palant

Research output: Contribution to journalConference articlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

With video microscopy and whole-cell patch-clamp recording techniques, the response of mesangial cells (MCs) of rat kidney to the exposure of hypoosmotic media was investigated in our study. It was observed that, decreasing extra-cellular tonicity by increments as large as 40 mosM, whole-cell patched mesangial cells can maintain their volumes without lysis. A model for cell volume regulation was proposed, whereby MCs are both sensors and effectors of water balance in the glomerulus. To investigate the membrane elasticity of mesangial cells, positive pressures were applied to pre-swollen cells through micropipette. Changes in cell dimension were measured, and area expansion modulus of mesangial cells was calculated based on Hooke's Law. The maximum fractional area expansion observed was 25%, which was much greater than the elastic limit reported (2-3%) for the bilayer[1]. The estimated area expansion modulus was 230 dynes/cm for mesangial cells.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)299-300
Number of pages2
JournalAnnual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology - Proceedings
Volume16
Issue numberpt 1
StatePublished - 1994
EventProceedings of the 16th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. Part 1 (of 2) - Baltimore, MD, USA
Duration: Nov 3 1994Nov 6 1994

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Signal Processing
  • Biomedical Engineering
  • Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
  • Health Informatics

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