Dielectrophoretic (DEP) separation of live/dead cells on a glass slide functionalized with interdigitated 3D silicon ring microelectrodes

This paper describes a microfluidic device which offers a dielectrophoretic solution to cell sorting via interdigitated 3D silicon (Si) electrodes on a transparent glass substrate. The Si electrodes with a self-aligned array of lateral rings were fabricated through a single mask process on an anodically bonded Si-glass wafer. The device has been characterized for separation of live/dead human colorectal carcinoma cells at select flow rates and voltages. The live cell capture and dead cell removal efficiencies both reached 90% at an AC activation of 5V_p 450kHz applied against a flow rate up to 0.25ml/hr. The device disclosed here, with successful demonstration of continuous live/dead cell separation, offers great potential as a bioparticle sorting front-end module for a lab-on-a chip system.