Figure 4.

Influence of culture and measurement conditions on cell mechanical properties of DLD-1 colon carcinoma cells: (a) Elastic moduli of cells from four independent measurements, arbitrarily split into two groups (control 1 and control 2). (b) Cell elastic moduli measured for cell populations with different culture confluency (20, 60, and 100%) before harvesting. (c) Cell elastic moduli in response to different detachment times before measurement (20, 60, and 100 min). (d) Cell elastic moduli measured for three different measurement media: PBS, HEPES-buffer, and DMEM cell culture medium. (e) Cell elastic moduli measured after coating the devices with 1 wt % pluronic for 0, 20, and 40 min. (f) Cell elastic moduli measured with devices coated for 30 min with pluronic concentrations of 0.25, 1, and 4 wt %. n > 1200 for each condition. ε_max and Δp histogram matching was performed separately for each (a)–(f). Numbers show mean ± SE. Significant (p < 0.05) differences to first parameter values (green bars) are indicated by asterisks. To see this figure in color, go online.