The capacity to dissect the properties of individual cells is crucial to expansive everyday science applications, from diagnosing infections and growing better therapeutics to describing pathogenic microorganisms and creating cells for bioproduction applications. Nonetheless, the precise examination of individual cells is a test, particularly with regards to a cell’s biophysical properties, because of the huge property varieties among cells, even in a similar cell populace, as well as the presence of uncommon cell types inside a bigger populace.
Tending to this need, Dr. Arum Han, Texas Instruments Teacher II in the Branch of Electrical and PC Designing at Texas A&M College, along with his alumni understudies and postdoctoral scientists, has fostered another innovation that can precisely break down cell properties using a solitary cell electrorotation microfluidic gadget, which uses an electric field to test the cell’s properties.
The innovation works by utilizing an electric field to initially catch a solitary cell in a microfluidic gadget, followed by applying a pivoting electric field to turn the single cell and estimating the speed of revolution. By knowing the information electric field boundaries and breaking down the turn speed, precisely dissecting the dielectric properties of a solitary cell becomes conceivable.
“You can extract many basic biophysical parameters of cells by knowing how much force was applied and how fast the cell spins,”
Dr. Arum Han, Texas Instruments Professor II in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
“By realizing how much power was applied and the way in which the cell turns, you can remove numerous fundamental biophysical properties of cells,” Han said.
There have been past endeavors to achieve this, but this innovation is the most reliable in estimating these properties as a result of its capacity to apply a high-recurrence electric field (up to 100 megahertz) and its utilization of an eight-terminal pair plan to at the same time trap a solitary cell and apply rotational power to the caught cell.
The exploration group’s discoveries are highlighted in Biomedical Microdevices.
This innovation has been completely evolved and applied to a few different cell examination applications. Having effectively shown the way that examination can be precisely finished on each cell in turn, Yuwen Li, graduate understudy in Han’s lab and the lead creator of the work, is currently driving the work to additionally foster the innovation so this can be executed at a much higher speed and against numerous cells at the same time.
More information: Yuwen Li et al, Measurement of dielectric properties of cells at single-cell resolution using electrorotation, Biomedical Microdevices (2022). DOI: 10.1007/s10544-022-00621-3
