Abstract
In the present study, experimental and numerical studies of dielectrophoretic (DEP) flow channel, a type of cell-separation devices that exploits the differences in the dielectric properties of cells, was conducted to design and propose a high-performance cell-separation DEP device. The cell samples used were live and dead cultured budding yeast cells suspended in water. The cell-separation analysis was carried out for the flow channel equipped with a planar electrode on the top face and an array of micro-fabricated electrodes on the bottom face; yielding a three dimensional non-uniform electric field across the full height of the flow channel. To determine the optimal separation condition for live and dead cell-mixtures, the value of the field frequency was varied in several ways. With the appropriately chosen operating condition, the live cells were effectively attracted toward the edges of electrodes on the bottom while the most of the dead cells continued to travel in the flow. The performance improvement of DEP cell-separation device can be expected by using the concept of the proposed device.
