Dielectrophoretic capture of mammalian cells using transparent indium tin oxide electrodes in microfluidic systems

Abstract

Transparent indium tin oxide microelectrodes were fabricated and used to immobilize suspended NIH 3T3 fibroblast cells by positive dielectrophoresis. The indium tin oxide electrodes facilitated microscopic observation of immobilized cells compared with opaque metallized electrodes. Dielectrophoresis was used to capture arrays of individual cells and form small cell clusters within a microfluidic network. The extent of cellular immobilization (no-cell, single-cell, or multiple-cell capture) was correlated with the applied voltage and inversely with the flow velocity. Specific conditions yielding predominantly single-cell capture were identified. The viability of immobilized cells was confirmed using fluorescence microscopy.

Recent advances in 2D and 3D in vitro systems using primary hepatocytes, alternative hepatocyte sources and non-parenchymal liver cells and their use in investigating mechanisms of hepatotoxicity, cell signaling and ADME

“…The co-cultures were able to express bile canicular transport proteins. Further progress was made by applying dielectrophoretic forces to sorting and active cell positioning in microfluidic devices (Docoslis et al 1999; Ho et al 2006a; Wang et al 1999b; Archer et al 1999; Sankaran et al 2008). Of note, Docoslis et al (1999) demonstrated that positive dielectrophoresis can be safely used to retain viable cells in perifusion cultures which provide a high degree of cell separation between viable and non-viable cells without any adverse effects on the cultured cells over long periods of time.…”

Dielectrophoresis in microfluidics technology

“…This unique dielectric signature can be utilized to discriminate and identify cells from the other particles or to detect and isolate diseased or damaged cells by means of AC-DEP (DEP force spectra of different cell types can be found elsewhere [118,144]). AC-DEP has been implemented for the separation of cancer cells from blood stream [17,18], the separation of red blood cells and polystyrene particles [19], the separation of human leukocytes [20], the isolation of the malaria-infected cells from the blood [21,22], the separation of the electroporated and non-electroporated cells [23], the separation of the platelets from diluted whole blood [24], the separation of red blood cells and the white blood cells [25], the separation [26][27][28] and sorting [29] of viable and nonviable yeast cells, the separation of healthy and unhealthy oocyte cells [30], the characterization and the sorting stem cells and their differentiated progeny [31], the isolation of rare cells from biological fluids [32], the separation of three distinct bacterial clones of commonly used E. coli MC1061 strain [33], trapping of viable mammalian fibroplast cells [34], trapping of DNA molecules [35], trapping of single cancer and endothelial cells to investigate pairwise cell interactions [36], trapping of bacterial cells for the subsequent electrodisruption or electroporation [37], focusing of polystyrene particles [38], trapping of yeast cells [39], 3-D focusing of polystyrene particles and yeast cells [40], the separation of airborne bacterium, Micrococcus luteus, from a mixture with dust and polystyrene beads [41], trapping and isolation of human stem cell from heterogeneous solution [42], single-cell isolation [43], concentration and counting of polystyrene particles [44], the separation of polystyrene particles, Jurkat cells and HeLa cells …”

Negative Dielectrophoretic Capture and Repulsion of Single Cells at a Bipolar Electrode: The Impact of Faradaic Ion Enrichment and Depletion

“…10 Third, DEP has been demonstrated to be useful for single cell manipulation. 12–14 This has been accomplished by constraining the trapping point either by adding physical barriers or by defining an electric field cage similar in size to a single cell. In either case, DEP conditions are chosen that prevent cell–cell attraction, thus discouraging multicell capture.…”