Microfluidic Chip-based Cell Deformability Analysis System Using Scattering Light Detection

Cell deformability refers to the ability of the cell to undergo a change in shape in response to a deforming force. It is a function of many factors and is treated as an important cell biology index. Many clues indicated that the decrease of cell deformability has a closely relationship with many diseases, such as diabetes, malaris, myocardial. Consequently, it is very important to develop a precise and reliable method to detect cell deformability.Traditional methods usually use filters, by detecting the transit time of cell passing through the filter to assess cell deformability. These methods are usually limited by their low throughput. Recently, several methods based on microfluidic chips have been proposed, which improved the throughput. However, some expensive instrument like high speed cameras are needed in these systems and the operation is complicated. All of these limit their application in real clinical analysis.In our work, a microfluidic chip-based cell deformability analysis system using light scattering detection has been developed. Instead of high speed camera, two photodiodes were used to measure the light signals when cells passed through a narrow channel. Cell deformability was assessed by comparing the transit times of the cells passing through the detection area and the peak width of single cell light signal. A new method using an on-chip sampling probe was proposed to introduce different cell samples, which simplified the operation and also prevented the cell sedimentation. The present system has advantages of simple structure, low cost, easy to operate, and fast analysis, which could be further developed into a portable instrument for actual clinical application.