High throughput miniature drug-screening platform using bioprinting technology

In the pharmaceutical industry, new drugs are tested to find appropriate compounds for therapeutic purposes for contemporary diseases. Unfortunately, novel compounds emerge at expensive prices and current target evaluation processes have limited throughput, thus leading to an increase of cost and time for drug development. This work shows the development of the novel inkjet-based deposition method for assembling a miniature drug-screening platform, which can realistically and inexpensively evaluate biochemical reactions in a picoliter-scale volume at a high speed rate. As proof of concept, applying a modified Hewlett Packard model 5360 compact disc printer, green fluorescent protein expressing Escherichia coli cells along with alginate gel solution have been arrayed on a coverslip chip under a repeatable volume of 180% ± 26% picoliters per droplet; subsequently, different antibiotic droplets were patterned on the spots of cells to evaluate the inhibition of bacteria for antibiotic screening. The proposed platform was compared to the current screening process, validating its effectiveness. The viability and basic function of the printed cells were evaluated, resulting in cell viability above 98% and insignificant or no DNA damage to human kidney cells transfected. Based on the reduction of investment and compound volume used by this platform, this technique has the potential to improve the actual drug discovery process at its target evaluation stage. (paper)