Abstract
Cell-based sensing platforms provide functional information on cellular effects of bioactive or toxic compounds in a sample. Current challenges concern the rather extended length of the assays as well as their limited reproducibility and sensitivity. We present a biosensing method capable of appraising, on a short time scale and with exquisite sensitivity, the occurrence and the magnitude of cellular alterations induced by low levels of a bioactive/toxic compound. Our method is based on integrating optogenetic control of non-electrogenic human cells, modified to express light sensitive protein channels, into a non-invasive electro-optical analytical platform enabling quantitative assessment of the stimulus dependent, dynamical cellular response. Our system exploits the interplay between optogenetic stimulation and time lapse fast impedance assays in boosting the platform sensitivity when exposing cells to a model exogenous stimulus, under both static and flow conditions. The proposed optogenetically modulated cell-based sensing platform is suitable for in field applications and provides a new paradigm for impedance-based sensing.