Microprinted liposomes as medical devices

It is further claimed that the artificial cells will also allow researchers to explore actions that take place at the cell membrane.

‘In a natural cell, so much is going on inside that it is extremely complex,’ said Sheereen Majd, assistant professor of biomedical engineering. ‘With these artificial cells - liposomes - we have just the shell, which gives us the ability to dissect the events that happen at the membrane.’

Understanding how drugs and pathogens cross the cell membrane barrier is essential in preventing disease and delivering drugs, and researchers have created artificial cells for quite some time.

However, Majd’s team is creating large arrays of artificial cells, made of lipids and proteins, of uniform size that can either remain attached to the substrate on which they grow, or become separated and used as freely moving vessels. The researchers report the results of their work in Advanced Materials.