# Strategy for Generating Giant Unilamellar Vesicles with Tunable Size Using the Modified cDICE Method

## TL;DR

This paper presents a method to create giant unilamellar vesicles with controlled sizes, improving their use in synthetic biology.

## Contribution

The study introduces a modified cDICE method with tunable parameters to control vesicle size distribution.

## Key findings

- Adjusting chamber rotation time and angular frequency refines GUV size distribution.
- High encapsulation efficiency is maintained at physiologically relevant salt concentrations.
- A physical model explains the observed size selection phenomena.

## Abstract

Our study investigates
an optimization strategy that
uses a size
cutoff in giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) generated from water-in-oil
(W/O) emulsion droplets using the modified continuous droplet interface
crossing encapsulation method. While this method is rapid and cost-effective
and yields high encapsulation efficiency, it suffers from a broad,
poorly controlled size distribution of vesicles, a significant drawback
for the construction of artificial cells. We address this by systematically
varying key parameters, such as chamber rotation time, angular frequency,
and inner solution density, to refine the GUV size distribution. Our
study highlights the importance of these parameters as practical experimental
knobs for the refinement of GUVs size. Our results are supported by
a physical model, which helps explain the observed size selection
phenomena. We also examine how the salinity of the inner solution
affects the encapsulation efficiency, finding that a high efficiency
is maintained even at physiologically relevant salt concentrations.
Our approach offers a practical method for selecting vesicle sizes,
thereby facilitating the creation of cell-sized compartments with
biologically relevant properties for synthetic biology applications.