Table 1. Control experiments and results.

Molecules on tip	Molecules or cells on substrate	Results
Fresh tip	hRBCs/IRBCs	No interaction
BSA* coated tip	hRBCs/IRBCs	No interaction
PEG† linkers	hRBCs/IRBCs	No interaction
TSP/CD36	PHA-E‡	Some interaction but much shorter extension compared with that collected on cells
TSP/CD36	hRBC	No interaction
CD36 with blocking antibody	IRBCs	Frequency of interaction was significantly reduced from 35.5% to 11.0% (P<0.001) after blocking
CIDR	CD36 with blocking antibody	Frequency of interaction was significantly reduced from 28.7% to 8.2% (P<0.001) after blocking
CD36 with CIDR	IRBCs	Binding frequency dropped from 16.4% to 9.1% (P = 0.0835) after addition of free CIDR molecules with final concentration of 200 µg/ml

All the possible combinations of different levels of functionalized AFM tips against different samples were tested to exclude non-specific interaction induced artifacts.

*BSA: Bovine serum albumin

^†PHA-E: Phytohemagglutinin E

^‡PEG: Polyethylene glycol