On-chip measurement of cellular mechanical properties using moiré fringe

This paper proposes the method for mechanical characterization of floating cells on a microfluidic chip. We measured the reactive force of cells on the chip by applying mechanical deformation to the cells. Particularly we focused on the method to improve the sensing resolution of the probe position by using the phase detection of moiré fringe. This method realized approximately ten times higher resolution compared to the previous method. The detailed data suggest some unique characteristics of cells. We discussed the phenomenon seen on the data with a mechanical model, which is based on Heltzian contact theory in the light of stiff nucleus.