Study of Process-Induced Cell Membrane Stability in Cell Direct Writing

Process-induced damage to cells is of significant importance and must be mitigated for safe and reproducible cell direct writing. The objective of this study is to investigate the cell membrane stability under the external normal pressure. This investigation is performed by studying the dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine bilayer behavior under different normal pressures using molecular dynamics. As the normal pressure increases, the force necessary to rupture the bilayer structure decreases, which indicates cell membrane instability under high normal pressure. This phenomenon can also be explained by the change of free energy difference before and after rupture under different normal pressures. The effect of the pulling speed on the rupture force is also investigated, showing that the rupture force increases almost linearly with the pulling speed.