Nec Corporation

Toshihiro Akaike

Shigeyuki Miyamoto

Akio Ohashi

Seishiro Tobe

The invention discloses a cell culture support which provides for the adhesion and culturing of one or more adhesive cells using a photoresist in which to provide a particular patterned design on a surface of the support. The patterned design is provided by the photoresist which is partially removed by photolithography during the making of the support which in turn imparts a striped, checkerboard or dotted pattern on the surface of the support. Further, the cell culture support is produced by pretreating the support surface with a reagent to provide hydrophobicity to the support surface. Also a reagent can be added to pretreat the support surface in order to facilitate adhesion at the photoresist prior to applying the photoresist into the cell culture support. Collagen is applied in the form of a solution, containing in addition thereto albumin and a crosslinking agent, in order to form a film. Collagen specifically affects the cell adhesion rate or the morphology of the cells to be adhered to the support. The steps of applying a photoresist, partially removing it, providing hydrophobicity to the cell support surface, applying a solution to affect cell adhesiveness, film formation and dissolving the remaining photoresist are carried out repeatedly. In addition using a solution to promote film formation of a different film composition and thickness than the first is applied to produce the cell culture support. By varying the film composition a patterned design, such as checker board, is developed for purposes of providing a cell culture support for adherent cells.

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Kanagawa, Japan

Toshihiro Akaike