Electric impedance microflow cytometry for characterization of cell disease states
- 12 July 2013
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) in Lab on a Chip
- Vol. 13 (19), 3903-3909
- https://doi.org/10.1039/c3lc50540e
Abstract
The electrical properties of biological cells have connections to their pathological states. Here we present an electric impedance microflow cytometry (EIMC) platform for the characterization of disease states of single cells. This platform entails a microfluidic device for a label-free and non-invasive cell-counting assay through electric impedance sensing. We identified a dimensionless offset parameter δ obtained as a linear combination of a normalized phase shift and a normalized magnitude shift in electric impedance to differentiate cells on the basis of their pathological states. This paper discusses a representative case study on red blood cells (RBCs) invaded by the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum. Invasion by P. falciparum induces physical and biochemical changes on the host cells throughout a 48-h multi-stage life cycle within the RBC. As a consequence, it also induces progressive changes in electrical properties of the host cells. We demonstrate that the EIMC system in combination with data analysis involving the new offset parameter allows differentiation of P. falciparum infected RBCs from uninfected RBCs as well as among different P. falciparum intraerythrocytic asexual stages including the ring stage. The representative results provided here also point to the potential of the proposed experimental and analysis platform as a valuable tool for non-invasive diagnostics of a wide variety of disease states and for cell separation.Keywords
This publication has 34 references indexed in Scilit:
- A microfabricated deformability-based flow cytometer with application to malariaLab on a Chip, 2011
- Single-cell bioelectrical impedance platform for monitoring cellular response to drug treatmentPhysical Biology, 2011
- Single-cell microfluidic impedance cytometry: a reviewMicrofluidics and Nanofluidics, 2010
- A unified approach to dielectric single cell analysis: Impedance and dielectrophoretic force spectroscopyLab on a Chip, 2010
- Continuous differential impedance spectroscopy of single cellsMicrofluidics and Nanofluidics, 2009
- Magnetic susceptibility of iron in malaria-infected red blood cellsBiochimica et Biophysica Acta (BBA) - Molecular Basis of Disease, 2009
- Refractive index maps and membrane dynamics of human red blood cells parasitized by Plasmodium falciparumProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2008
- On‐chip non‐invasive and label‐free cell discrimination by impedance spectroscopyCell Proliferation, 2008
- Biomechanics and biophysics of cancer cellsActa Biomaterialia, 2007
- Dielectric properties of human normal, malignant and cirrhotic liver tissue:in vivoandex vivomeasurements from 0.5 to 20 GHz using a precision open-ended coaxial probePhysics in Medicine & Biology, 2007