Detection of living cervical cancer cells by transient terahertz spectroscopy

The photonic energy of terahertz wave is in the same order of magnitude as the rotational and vibrational energy levels of organic and biological macromolecules, so it has unique advantages in detecting cells and biological macromolecules. However, in the life environment, the dynamic time scale of...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of biophotonics 2021-01, Vol.14 (1), p.e202000237-n/a
Main Authors: Shi, Wei, Wang, Yuezheng, Hou, Lei, Ma, Cheng, Yang, Lei, Dong, Chengang, Wang, Zhiquan, Wang, Haiqing, Guo, Juan, Xu, Shenglong, Li, Jing
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
absorbance
Absorption
Beer law
Cancer
Cervical cancer
Cervix
Conformation
Energy levels
living cervical cancer cells
Macromolecules
Spectroscopy
Terahertz frequencies
terahertz time‐domain spectroscopy
transient terahertz spectroscopy
Wave fronts
Waveforms
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Summary:The photonic energy of terahertz wave is in the same order of magnitude as the rotational and vibrational energy levels of organic and biological macromolecules, so it has unique advantages in detecting cells and biological macromolecules. However, in the life environment, the dynamic time scale of cell‐environment interaction and structural conformation change of biological macromolecules are within picosecond to millisecond, and water has strong absorption to terahertz wave, which has become the bottleneck problem for the detection of cells and biological macromolecules by terahertz technology. In this article, we developed a set of terahertz single measurement system based on the tilt wave front of grating pulse technique. The system was employed for the terahertz detection of trace living cervical cancer cells. We achieved transient detection of the terahertz pulse time‐domain waveform of the living HeLa cells. The characteristic absorption peaks were identified by Lambert‐Beer law, respectively, at 0.49, 0.71, 1.04, 1.07, 1.26 and 1.37 THz. The absorbance is proportional to the cell concentration. The most attractive feature of terahertz technology is its unique spectral response to biological cells and tissues. After the establishment of a new test system, the characteristic absorption spectrum of cervical cancer cells can be measured instantaneously (155 ps). The two problems of long time and difficult detection of living cells in terahertz detection were solved.
ISSN:1864-063X
1864-0648
DOI:10.1002/jbio.202000237