Parallel trapping of single motile cells using vibratin-induced flow on microfluidic chip

We propose an on-chip cell manipulation method for a parallel trapping of single motile cells. The proposed method enables a parallel trapping of large (≳ 50 μm) motile cells, that is difficult to be achieved with conventional cell manipulation methods. We realize the trapping method by using a vibration-induced flow which is induced by applying a vibration to a microfluidic chip having microstructures on its surface. By applying a rectilinear vibration to a chip with a micropillar array, a localized flow pattern to trap single motile cells are generated around the micropillars. We succeeded in a parallel trapping of single Euglena (size is approximately 50–100 μm) by using the proposed method. Furthermore, we demonstrated one application of the method for an evaluation of motility of motile cells with a single cell level.

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