Effects of Chip Geometries on Dielectrophoresis and Electrorotation Investigation

The electric fields employed for such work are generated using chips, such as planar linear interdigitated arrays or two parallel arrays. However, chip geometries usually affect the investigation of dielectrophoresis （DEP） and electrorotation （ER） significantly, and even may misdirect the theoretical prediction. In order to understand the electrodes geometries effect and provide a suitable range of parameters, three-dimensional simulations for the DEP and ER characterizations on the quadrupolar hyperbolical electrodes are carried out. Influences of the electrodes gaps, cell height, work region, energized voltage and frequencies for the DEP and ER manipulations are analyzed, and the analysis results show that the gaps of the electrodes and the cell height have enormous effects, but the work region is not so important. Moreover, depending on the theoretical analysis, ER experiments for polystyrene microspheres with the diameter of 20 ~m are carried out on two kinds of chips. The experimental results show that the microspheres rotate in the counter-field direction and the maximum rotation speed appears in the megahertz range. In addition, the experimental results are compared with the simulation results, showing that the three-dimensional simulations considering the chip geometries are more accurate than the two-dimensional predictions. This paper provides a new understanding for the theoretical predictions of DEP and ER manipulations, which decreases the difference of the theoretical and experimental results significantly, and will be significant for the lab chip research.

Theory of Electrorotation of Clustered Colloidal Particles

When a colloidal suspension is exposed to a strong rotating electric field, an aggregation of the suspended particles is induced to appear. In such clusters, the separation between the suspended particles is so close that one could not neglect the multiple image effect on the electrorotation (ER) spectrum. Since so far the exact multiple image method exists in two dimensions only, rather than in three dimensions, we investigate the ER spectrum of the clustered colloidal particles in two dimensions, in which many cylindrical particles are randomly distributed in a sheet cluster. We report the dependence of the ER spectrum on the materialparameters. It is shown that the multiple image method predicts two characteristic frequencies, at which the rotation speed reaches maximum. To this end, the multiple image method is numerically demonstrated to be in good agreement with the known Maxwell-Garnett approximation.

Electrorotation: A Spectroscopic Imaging Approach to Study the Alterations of the Cytoplasmic Membrane

Electrorotation (ER) is a technique allowing the characterization of the surface properties of a variety of supra-molecular aggregates and living cultured cells as well as cellular organelles and biological materials in general. In particular, this technique allows measuring two important physical parameters of the cell membrane: specific capacitance and specific conductance. These parameters are strictly related to the structure/function relationships of the biological membrane;ER becomes thus a powerful means to investigate a number of phenomena involving the membrane integrity. These phenomena may originate from treatments with exogenous molecules and/or from pathological effects. Concerning these aspects, the study of the transfer of exogenous material (i.e. cat-anionic vesicles or liposomes) across the cell membrane assumes a high importance. This review is focused on the physical functioning principles of ER and on the quantitative analysis of the experimental measurements. This work also reports on different fields of application of ER with particular reference to data obtained in our laboratory. The investigation of the alterations of the cytoplasmic membrane function, as evidenced by this strategy, will be illustrated in detail.

Manipulation of gold coated microspheres using electrorotation

The electrorotation of microspheres coated with conductive surface is a novel and important technology for label-free biosensors. Using the electroless plating approach, the polystyrene microspheres with 15 μm and 25 μm in diameters were coated with 50 nm gold layer in thickness. The electrorotation experiments on those gold coated polystyrene microspheres (GCPMs) were carried out. The results showed that they rotated in the opposite direction of the electric field in a low frequency range (100-100 kHz), and the maximum rotation speed was higher than that of uncoated microspheres. Based on the theory of traveling wave electroosmosis(TWEO) and induced charge electroosmosis (ICEO), the electrorotation of GCPMs was quantitively analyzed and confirmed by observing the fluid flow around GCPM. The equations describing the electroration speed of GCPMs were proposed, which are consistent with the experiment results.

Detection of the apoptosis of Jurkat cell using an electrorotation chip

The apoptosis of cells is one of the fields that attract increasing attention in biology today.Usually,the cells are treated with chemicals when detecting apoptosis.It is highly desired to detect apoptosis in a real-time basis.Apoptosis of Jurkat cells was studied using a real-time electrorotation chip.This chip allows the detection of the cell membrane capacitance changes during the course of apoptosis and therefore facilitates the analysis of apoptosis in a real-time basis without involving any chemical treatment.

Control of the Dielectric Microrods Rotation in Liquid by Alternating Current Electric Field

Microfluidics is a promising system for the manipulation of micro-nano particles and fluids. In this platform, alternating current （AC） electric field is usual an effective tool for the general particles control. However, traditional work paid more attention on the regular spherical particles with no obvious distinction when rotating, resulting in imprecise rotation speed calculation. In essence, non-spherical especially biocompatible particles are not only important for biology application but also significant for obtaining accurate rotating results. Hence, in this paper, SU-8, one of the most biocompatible materials was selected as the manipulation object. AC electric field is employed to rotate SU-8 microrods, in order to obtain a controllable rotation angle for both the accurate experimental results and biosensor applications. Firstly, Clausius-Mossotti（CM） factors frequency spectra with different surface conductance and medium conductivities are presented, thereby the theoretical formula is carried out, including both the torque and rotation velocity expressions of SU-8 microrods. Moreover, simulations for the electric field distribution are developed, indicating the rotating direction. Secondly, the quadrupole electrodes are used to generate rotating electric field, and the electrorotation of SU-8 microrods in different medium is carried out, showing that the particles rotate in the opposite direction of the electric field, meanwhile, the peak frequency increases with the conductivity increases. Finally, the experimental results are discussed and compared with theoretical analysis, and the comparison result shows that they have a good agreement. This work proposes an effective and controllable method to rotate microrods, showing extend application potentials in microelectronics and biosensors.

Dielectric Behavior of Oblate Spheroidal Particles：Application to Erythrocytes Suspensions

We have investigated the pressure effect on the eletrorotation (ER) spectrum of living cell suspensions byconsidering the particle shape effect. In particular, we consider coated oblate spheroidal particles and present a theoreticalstudy of ER based on the spectral representation theory. Analytic expressions for the characteristic frequency as wellas the dispersion strength can be obtained, thus simplifying the fitting of experimental data on oblate spheroidal cellsthat abound in the literature. From the theoretical analysis, we find that the cellshape, coating as well as materialparameters can change the ER spectrum. We demonstrate a good agreement between our theoretical predictions andexperimental data on human erthrocytes suspensions.