[1P01-52] Poster Presentation

[1P32] Development of an efficient fabrication process for more stable devices for the application of intramembrane lateral voltage to artificial cell membrane systems

*Tatsuya Nomoto^1,2, Maki Komiya¹, Syunsuke Nomura^1,3, Teng Ma⁴, Daisuke Tadaki¹, Hideaki Yamamoto¹, Yuzuru Tozawa⁵, Ayumi Hirano^1,4 (1. Research Institute of Electrical Communication, Tohoku University, 2. Graduate School of Biomedical Engineering, Tohoku University, 3. Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University, 4. Advanced Institute for Materials Research (WPI-AIMR), Tohoku University, 5. Graduate School of Science and Engineering , Saitama University)

Recently, we found that, in addition to the conventional transmembrane voltage, the voltage applied laterally to the membrane can reactivate once inactivated human voltage-gated Na ion channel membrane proteins using an artificial cell membrane system . This finding suggests that lateral voltage may be an important novel parameter for promoting the activity of ion channels prone to inactivation, which are difficult to measure by conventional methods. However, the short electrode lifetime and low yield of lateral voltage-applying devices are major bottlenecks in the establishment of a new lateral voltage-based ion channel function analysis system. The usable lifetime of the lateral voltage application devices is as short as 20 minutes due to oxidation of the Ti electrodes, and the fabrication yield is less than 10% due to cracks in the SiO₂ layer used as the insulating layer. In this study, to address these issues, we aimed to develop a highly efficient fabrication process for more stable and longer-lived devices by using Au, a non-oxidizing metal, as the electrodes and CYTOP, a flexible insulating coating, as the insulating layer.