Fig. 7
From: Effect of silica-coated magnetic nanoparticles on rigidity sensing of human embryonic kidney cells
Spatial force distribution and directionality parameter. a Spatial force distribution (red arrows) at the edge of the cell. The yellow line indicates the approximate cell boundary. The direction and length of red arrows indicate the magnitude and direction of TF vectors. b Schematic of the directionality parameter (γ) and pillar forces. c Directionality parameter γ for areas of 34.5 μm2 on the edges of untreated or treated with MNPs@SiO2(RITC) at 0.1 µg or 1 µg/µL. (n = 20 frames of two cells for each sample). *** P < 0.001. Student’s t-test. A value of γ = 1 means that parallel forces are exerted on submicron pillars while γ = 0 means that locally balanced forces are exerted on the pillars. More details on this can be found in the Materials and Methods section. Student’s t-test. d Immunoblotting analysis of phosphorylated and total PXN. p-, phosphorylated protein; t, total protein. β-actin is used as an internal control