Sensors (May 2012)

Single-Cell Electric Lysis on an Electroosmotic-Driven Microfluidic Chip with Arrays of Microwells

  • Yu-Hung Chen,
  • Ju-Hsiu Hsiao,
  • Chun-Ping Jen,
  • Ya-Hui Liu,
  • Tamara G. Amstislavskaya

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/s120606967
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 12, no. 6
pp. 6967 – 6977

Abstract

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Accurate analysis at the single-cell level has become a highly attractive tool for investigating cellular content. An electroosmotic-driven microfluidic chip with arrays of 30-µm-diameter microwells was developed for single-cell electric lysis in the present study. The cellular occupancy in the microwells when the applied voltage was 5 V (82.4%) was slightly higher than that at an applied voltage of 10 V (81.8%). When the applied voltage was increased to 15 V, the cellular occupancy in the microwells dropped to 64.3%. More than 50% of the occupied microwells contain individual cells. The results of electric lysis experiments at the single-cell level indicate that the cells were gradually lysed as the DC voltage of 30 V was applied; the cell was fully lysed after 25 s. Single-cell electric lysis was demonstrated in the proposed microfluidic chip, which is suitable for high-throughput cell lysis.

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