The team of MIT engineers led by Joel Voldman, associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science, and Rudolf Jaenisch, professor of biology and a member of the Whitehead Institute has developed an efficient way to pair up cells so they can be fused together into a hybrid cell. The new technique should make it much easier for scientists to study what happens when two cells are combined. For example, fusing an adult cell and an embryonic stem cell allows researchers to study the genetic reprogramming that occurs in such hybrids. The sorting method increases the rate of successful cell fusion from around 10 percent to about 50 percent. This technique could be used to study interactions between any types of cells.

Vasil Sidorov on March 18, 2009 after MIT News