Institute of Biophysics in Ljubljana is a leading research laboratory for experimental and theoretical biophysics in Slovenia. Our research spans from biophysics of lipid membranes and living cells to physics of complex fluids and microfluidics. Our core team consists of experimental and theoretical physicists as well as a cell biologist. In the field of microfluidics, we focus on development of new systems for high-throughput single-cell analysis and new experimental approaches for basic research in biomedicine, synthetic biology of membranes and soft-matter physics.

The Institute’s research infrastructure comprises a range of advanced optical microscopes (confocal, EPI-fluorescence, TIRF, polarizing), optical tweezers, cell laboratory and a fully equipped laboratory for microfluidics.

Figure 1: We have developed a microfluidic diffusion chamber, which provides a flow-free environment for accurate analysis of single cells during controlled changes of their chemical environment (the movie on the right shows a burst of a leukocyte exposed to water).

Figure 2: Real-time monitoring of Perilipin4 adsorption to oil surface in a microfluidic system. A488 labeled Perilipin4 readily adsorbs to oil surface (left) while fluorescent dye A488 alone does not (right)

Publications

  • Gimenez-Andres, M., Emeršič, T., Antoine-Bally, S., D’Ambrosio, J.M., Antonny, B., Derganc, J. and Čopič, A., 2021. Exceptional stability of a perilipin on lipid droplets depends on its polar residues, suggesting multimeric assembly. Elife, 10, p.e61401.
  • Zemljič-Jokhadar, Š., Kokot, G., Pavlin, M. and Derganc, J., 2021. Adhesion and Stiffness of Detached Breast Cancer Cells In Vitro: Co-Treatment with Metformin and 2-Deoxy-d-glucose Induces Changes Related to Increased Metastatic Potential. Biology, 10(9), p.873.