On-Chip Living-Cell Microarrays for Network Biology
 
On-Chip Living-Cell Microarrays for Network Biology 
 
Ronnie Willaert, Hichem Sahli
 
Abstract 

The recently developed field of systems biology creates a new framework for understanding the molecular basis of physiological or pathophysiological states of cells. Screening modalities that can be used on single cells are needed to study cellular systems biology. The recent development of cellular microarrays has provided a method for the complex molecular analysis of living, single cells (Chen & Davies, 2006). Unlike other highthroughput systems, such as gene expression profiling microarrays or protein microarrays, cellular microarrays use a printed pattern of geographically distinct spots to probe living cells, rather than cell lysates, or other non-viable samples. Among the most powerful tools to assay gene function on a genome-wide scale in the physiological context of intact living cells are fluorescence microscopy and related imaging techniques (Pepperkok & Ellenberg, 2006). To enable these techniques to be applied to functional genomics experiments, fluorescence microscopy is making the transition to a quantitative and high-throughput technology.