Cells in vitro and in vivo navigate complex environments through the integration of a wide variety of cues, including diffusible factors, substrate-bound factors, electrical and magnetic fields, substrate rigidity, and topography. Some cues, such as diffusible factors, are easily isolated and have been systematically altered and presented to cells in culture. Other factors, including the topography introduced by one cell type and presented to a second cell type in co-culture, are difficult to introduce without inherently changing a multitude of variables that other cells contribute. So far, the difficulties in reproducing the complex shapes of cells without cellular components has left the influence of cellular topography unexplored. Here, we present a novel method of fabricating transparent, biocompatible polymeric substrates with biomimetic, cell- shaped surfaces with a resolution in the submicron range. As a result, the contribution of cellular topography as an independent factor in co-cultures can be studied for the first time.
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