Diffusion of small molecules into medaka embryos improved by electroporation

BMC Biotechnology

Research Article

Andrea Friesenhengst¹  Thomas Czerny¹  Gerlinde Jung¹  Markus Hug¹  Christian Halter²  Johann Walzer² 

[1] Department for Applied Life Sciences, University of Applied Sciences, FH Campus Wien, Helmut-Qualtinger-Gasse 2, A-1030, Vienna, Austria;Department for Engineering, University of Applied Sciences, FH Campus Wien, Favoritenstrasse 226, A-1100, Vienna, Austria;

关键词: Medaka;    Small molecules;    Diffusion;    Toxicology;    Electroporation;    LiCl;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1472-6750-13-53

 received in 2013-02-14, accepted in 2013-06-17,  发布年份 2013

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundDiffusion of small molecules into fish embryos is essential for many experimental procedures in developmental biology and toxicology. Since we observed a weak uptake of lithium into medaka eggs we started a detailed analysis of its diffusion properties using small fluorescent molecules.ResultsContrary to our expectations, not the rigid outer chorion but instead membrane systems surrounding the embryo/yolk turned out to be the limiting factor for diffusion into medaka eggs. The consequence is a bi-phasic uptake of small molecules first reaching the pervitelline space with a diffusion half-time in the range of a few minutes. This is followed by a slow second phase (half-time in the range of several hours) during which accumulation in the embryo/yolk takes place. Treatment with detergents improved the uptake, but strongly affected the internal distribution of the molecules. Testing electroporation we could establish conditions to overcome the diffusion barrier. Applying this method to lithium chloride we observed anterior truncations in medaka embryos in agreement with its proposed activation of Wnt signalling.ConclusionsThe diffusion of small molecules into medaka embryos is slow, caused by membrane systems underneath the chorion. These results have important implications for pharmacologic/toxicologic techniques like the fish embryo test, which therefore require extended incubation times in order to reach sufficient concentrations in the embryos.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Jung et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2013. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.