Quantification of nanoparticle endocytosis based on double fluorescent pH-sensitive nanoparticles

Andréa Kurtz-Chalot (1, 2, 3) , Jean-Philippe Klein (3, 4, 5) , Jérémie Pourchez (1, 2, 3) , Delphine Boudard (2, 3, 4, 5) , Valérie Bin (2, 3, 5) , Odile Sabido (2, 3, 5) , Laurence Marmuse (6) , Michèle Cottier (2, 3, 4, 5) , Valérie Forest (1, 2, 3)

1 BIOPI-ENSMSE - Ingénierie des Biomatériaux et des Particules Inhalées
2 IFRESIS - Institut Fédératif de Recherche en Sciences et Ingénierie de la Santé
3 LINA-ENSMSE - Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire d'Etude des Nanoparticules Aérosolisées
4 CHU ST-E - Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Saint-Etienne [CHU Saint-Etienne]
5 UJM - Université Jean Monnet - Saint-Étienne
6 Nano-H

Amorphous silica is a particularly interesting material because of its inertness and chemical stability. Silica nanoparticles have been recently developed for biomedical purposes but their innocuousness must be carefully investigated before clinical use. The relationship between nanoparticles physicochemical features, their uptake by cells and their biological activity represents a crucial issue, especially for the development of nanomedicine. This work aimed at adapting a method for the quantification of nanoparticle endocytosis based on pH-sensitive and double fluorescent particles. For that purpose, silica nanoparticles containing two fluorophores: FITC and pHrodoTM were developed, their respective fluorescence emission depends on the external pH. Indeed, FITC emits a green fluorescence at physiological pH and pHrodoTM emits a red fluorescence which intensity increased with acidification. Therefore, nanoparticles remained outside the cells could be clearly distinguished from nanoparticles uptaken by cells as these latter could be spotted inside cellular acidic compartments (such as phagolysosomes, micropinosomes...). Using this model, the endocytosis of 60 nm nanoparticles incubated with the RAW 264.7 macrophages was quantified using time-lapse microscopy and compared to that of 130 nm submicronic particles. The amount of internalized particles was also evaluated by fluorimetry. The biological impact of the particles was also investigated in terms of cytotoxicity, pro-inflammatory response and oxidative stress. Results clearly demonstrated that nanoparticles were more uptaken and more reactive than submicronic particles. Moreover, we validated a method of endocytosis quantification.

Keywords: cellular uptake; cytotoxicity.; Silica particles; macrophages; size

Domains: Life Sciences [q-bio]

Andréa Kurtz-Chalot, Jean-Philippe Klein, Jérémie Pourchez, Delphine Boudard, Valérie Bin, et al.. Quantification of nanoparticle endocytosis based on double fluorescent pH-sensitive nanoparticles. Biomedical Microdevices, 2015, 17 (2), pp.42. ⟨10.1007/s10544-015-9947-8⟩. ⟨hal-01215438⟩