Advances and applications of isomotive dielectrophoresis for cell analysis

• Published in: Analytical and bioanalytical chemistry 2020-06, Vol.412 (16), p.3813-3833
• Main Authors: Rashed, Mohamed Z., Williams, Stuart J.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Analysis; Analytical Chemistry; Bioanalytics and Higher Order Electrokinetics; Biochemistry; Bioengineering; Biomedical materials; Cell Separation - methods; Cells; Characterization and Evaluation of Materials; Chemistry; Chemistry and Materials Science; Dielectrophoresis; Electric fields; Electrokinetics; Electrophoresis - methods; Equipment Design; Food Science; Laboratory Medicine; Methods; Microfluidics; Monitoring/Environmental Analysis; Review; Separation
• ISSN: 1618-2642; 1618-2650
• DOI: 10.1007/s00216-020-02590-z

Isomotive dielectrophoresis (isoDEP) is a unique electric field such that the gradient of the field-squared ( ∇ E rms 2 ) is constant, resulting a uniform dielectrophoretic force. The current status of isoDEP is presented in this review, and we will highlight the progress that has been achieved over the past 60 years in various avenues of isoDEP since H.A. Pohl initially described its premise. This article will discuss its applications and describe the various configurations of generating an isomotive force. Since H.A. Pohl introduced the theory of isoDEP, numerous authors have implemented isoDEP as a tool for the manipulation, sorting, separation, and characterization of polarizable particles without the need for biochemical labels or other bioengineered tagging. The growing field of microfluidics and electrokinetics has renewed interest in isoDEP, particularly for analytical characterization or separation of particles. Recent work has demonstrated that isoDEP can address some unmet needs for biomedical applications including single-cell analysis; moreover, advances in throughput as well as combining characterization and separation simultaneously will add significant value to isoDEP.