High-throughput screening of encapsulated islets using wide-field lens-free on-chip imaging

TL;DR

This paper introduces a high-throughput, lens-free on-chip imaging system for quality screening of encapsulated islets, significantly increasing efficiency and providing detailed analysis for diabetes treatment research.

Contribution

The study presents a novel, large-field lens-free imaging platform capable of analyzing thousands of microcapsules simultaneously, improving upon traditional low-throughput microscopic inspection methods.

Findings

Imaged and analyzed ~8,000 microcapsules in a single frame

Provided detailed information on capsule count, size, and integrity

Enabled efficient quality control for encapsulation protocols

Abstract

Islet microencapsulation is a promising solution to diabetes treatment, but its quality control based on manual microscopic inspection is extremely low-throughput, highly variable and laborious. This study presents a high-throughput islet-encapsulation quality screening system based on lens-free on-chip imaging with a wide field-of-view of 18.15 cm^2, which is more than 100 times larger than that of a lens-based optical microscope, enabling it to image and analyze ~8,000 microcapsules in a single frame. Custom-written image reconstruction and processing software provides the user with clinically important information, such as microcapsule count, size, intactness, and information on whether each capsule contains an islet. This high-throughput and cost-effective platform can be useful for researchers to develop better encapsulation protocols as well as perform quality control prior to transplantation.