Fabrication of Ferritin Nanoparticle Patterns for Controlling Neuron Adhesion and Neurite Outgrowth

The interaction between neurons and nanostructured substrates is a topic of increasing interest due to the possibility of manipulating individual cells on substrates on length scales of protein size. Moreover, patterns of biochemical ligand cues are known to play a crucial role in neuronal network guidance. A comprehensive study of cell adhesion to biomaterials opens promising strategies for controlling cell viability, cell faith, neuronal network formation, and other applications. In this research, we combine a top-down lithography approach with bottom-up protein self-assembly to fabricate positively charged ferritin nanoparticles (FerNPs) patterns on silicon substrates, which can be used to control neuron adhesion and guided neurite outgrowth. The positively charged surface of FerNPs acts as cell adhesion sites, while the background is passivated by the trichloro(1H,1H,2H,2H-perflueooctyl) silane molecules as a cell repellent backfill. We have found a high guidance efficiency of 88% for neurons on the patterns. This finding opens potential applications for advanced controlling of cell adhesion and neurite guidance.