Automated indirect manipulation of irregular shaped cells with Optical Tweezers for studying collective cell migration

Studying collective migration of cells is currently of considerable interest in biology and medicine leading to possibility of novel diagnosis and treatments. Some cells are highly sensitive to direct laser exposure, which may influence their behavior or even cause photodamage. In addition, manual manipulation of cells is time consuming making it hard to carry out systematic studies that are properly timed to exhibit the desired motility. This paper presents an automated planning approach for precise, collision-free, indirect manipulation of cells with irregular, dynamically changing shapes using Optical Tweezers (OT). We have evaluated the effectiveness of our manipulation approach using physical experiments. We have also carried out an experimental study to demonstrate the effect of the indirect manipulation approach on cell-viability.