Atomic Force Microspopy Measurements of Intermolecular Binding Strength

Intermolecular binding forces are intrinsic property of cohesive structures and should be used as the main quantitative criteria for assessing and defining their functional contribution to the maintenance of the anatomical integrity of the adult and embryonal multicellular organism, to fertilization, to blood cell adhesiveness in normal and pathological conditions, to tumor cell adhesion, to parasite-host interactions, and to cellular associations in symbiotic organism. Recently, a novel technology of atomic force microscopy (AFM) measurements of binding strength between a single pair of cell adhesion molecules in various physiological solution was developed (1 ). Binding studies, calorimetric, and spectroscopic analyses do not provide direct information about binding forces and are thus complementary kinetic methods to AFM measurements.