Ink Jet Printers in the Lab and Asthma in the Airways

Newswise — Asthma's mechanical impact on the cells lining constricted airways and how a color ink jet printer can be used to study muscle fiber formation are the two top "Hot Picks" chosen from more than 380 late-breaking abstracts to be presented on the last day of the American Society for Cell Biology's Annual Meeting on Wednesday, Dec. 8, at the Washington Convention Center.

Each year, the ASCB's Public Information Committee (PIC) screens "late abstracts" submitted after the regular August 1st deadline, looking for late-breaking data or novel results. The PIC selected abstracts by Rina Mitsutake of the University of Tokyo in Japan and by Roberto J. Roman of the University of Puerto Rico in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico as its 2004 "Hot Picks."

Working with R. Matsuda, Mitsutake used a color ink jet printer to lay down an extremely precise pattern of gelatin stripes on which the alignment of cultured mouse muscles cells could be mapped. Roman, working in collaboration with E. Chu of the Physiology Program at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, used microarray analysis of cultured human bronchial epithelial cells to identify two genes that respond to the tremendous mechanical stresses generated in the constricted airways of asthmatics.

Late abstracts are always presented as posters on the last day of the ASCB Annual Meeting from 7:30 AM to 3 PM.

Here are the details on the Hot Pick abstracts:

04-LB-2970-ASCB I01, Epithelia Regulation of developmental genes SPRY2 and TWST by mechanical compression in airway epithelial cells. R. J. Roman,1 D. J. Tschumperlin,2 E. Chu2 ; 1 Biology, University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez, PR, 2 Physiology Program, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA

Late Abstract Submission 04-LB-2971-ASCB, C04 Cell Attachment to the Extracellular MatrixIn vitro Muscle Fiber Formation on Patterned Gelatin Stripes Printed by a Color Ink-jet PrinterR. Mitsutake,1 R. Matsuda2 ; 1 Department of Biological Sciences, the University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan, 2 Department of Biological Sciences,and Department of Life Sciences, the University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan