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Cytoskeletal Remodeling and Gap Junction Translocation Mediates Blood–Brain Barrier Disruption by Non-invasive Low-Voltage Pulsed Electric Fields

  • S.I.: Electroporation for Medical Applications and Biotechnology
  • Published:
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Abstract

High-voltage pulsed electric fields (HV-PEF) delivered with invasive needle electrodes for electroporation applications is known to induce off-target blood–brain barrier (BBB) disruption. In this study, we sought to determine the feasibility of minimally invasive PEF application to produce BBB disruption in rat brain and identify the putative mechanisms mediating the effect. We observed dose-dependent presence of Evans Blue (EB) dye in rat brain when PEF were delivered with a skull mounted electrode used for neurostimulation application. Maximum region of dye uptake was observed while using 1500 V, 100 pulses, 100 µs and 10 Hz. Results of computational models suggested that the region of BBB disruption was occurring at thresholds of 63 V/cm or higher; well below intensity levels for electroporation. In vitro experiments recapitulating this effect with human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) demonstrated cellular alterations that underlie BBB manifests at low-voltage high-pulse conditions without affecting cell viability or proliferation. Morphological changes in HUVECs due to PEF were accompanied by disruption of actin cytoskeleton, loss of tight junction protein—ZO-1 and VE-Cadherin at cell junctions and partial translocation into the cytoplasm. Uptake of propidium iodide (PI) in PEF treated conditions is less than 1% and 2.5% of total number of cells in high voltage (HV) and low-voltage (LV) groups, respectively, implying that BBB disruption to be independent of electroporation under these conditions. 3-D microfabricated blood vessel permeability was found to increase significantly following PEF treatment and confirmed with correlative cytoskeletal changes and loss of tight junction proteins. Finally, we show that the rat brain model can be scaled to human brains with a similar effect on BBB disruption characterized by electric field strength (EFS) threshold and using a combination of two bilateral HD electrode configurations.

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Funding

G.S. acknowledges grant and funding support from the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute of Diabetes, and Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number U54CA137788/U54CA132378, R01CA236615 and R01DK129990, the Department of Defense CDMRP PRCRP Award CA170630, and the Institute for Applied Life Sciences in the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. MB is supported by Grants from Harold Shames and the National Institutes of Health: NIH-NIDA UG3DA048502, NIH-NIGMS T34 GM137858, NIH-NINDS R01 NS112996, NIH-NINDS R01 NS101362, and NIH-G-RISE T32GM136499.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, MA, USA

    Neeraj Raghuraman Rajagopalan, Juan M. Jiménez & Govindarajan Srimathveeravalli

  2. Department of Radiology, Interventional Radiology Service, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NY, USA

    William-Ray Vista & Masashi Fujimori

  3. Department of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, Amsterdam UMC, Amsterdam, Netherlands

    Laurien G. P. H. Vroomen

  4. Division of Neuromodulation, Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Niranjan Khadka

  5. Synchron Inc, Brooklyn, NY, USA

    Niranjan Khadka

  6. Department of Biomedical Engineering, The City College of New York, New York, NY, USA

    Niranjan Khadka & Marom Bikson

  7. Institute for Applied Life Sciences, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, MA, USA

    Govindarajan Srimathveeravalli

  8. Department of Radiology, Mie University, Tsu, Mie, Japan

    Masashi Fujimori

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  1. Neeraj Raghuraman Rajagopalan
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Contributions

Experimental design: GS, NRR; In vitro experiments: NRR; In vivo experiments: WRV, MF, LV, GS; Computational modeling: NK, MB; Data analysis: NRR, WRV, MF, LV, NK, GS; Statistical analysis: NRR, GS; Manuscript preparation: NRR, JJ, GS, MB.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Govindarajan Srimathveeravalli.

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Conflict of interest

The authors report no relevant disclosures related to the work presented here. The City University of New York has intellectual property (IP) on neuro-stimulation systems and methods with authors NK and MB as inventors. NK is an employee of Synchron, Inc. and consults for Ybrain, Inc. and Ceragem Medical. MB has equity in Soterix Medical, Inc. MB consults, received grants, assigned inventions, and/or serves on the SAB of SafeToddles, Boston Scientific, GlaxoSmithKline, Biovisics, Mecta, Lumenis, Halo Neuroscience, Google-X, i-Lumen, Humm, Allergan (Abbvie), and Apple. G.S. holds stock options in Aperture Medical.

Disclosure

Confocal images were imaged in the Light Microscopy Facility and Nikon Center of Excellence at the Institute for Applied Life Sciences, University of Massachusetts Amherst with support from the Massachusetts Life Science Center. The 3-D printed parts and mastermolds were printed using Advanced Digital Design and Fabrication core facility, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

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Rajagopalan, N.R., Vista, WR., Fujimori, M. et al. Cytoskeletal Remodeling and Gap Junction Translocation Mediates Blood–Brain Barrier Disruption by Non-invasive Low-Voltage Pulsed Electric Fields. Ann Biomed Eng 52, 89–102 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10439-023-03211-3

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