Parallel trapping of single motile cells using vibratin-induced flow on microfluidic chip

We propose an on-chip cell manipulation method for a parallel trapping of single motile cells. The proposed method enables a parallel trapping of large (≳ 50 μm) motile cells, that is difficult to be achieved with conventional cell manipulation methods. We realize the trapping method by using a vibration-induced flow which is induced by applying a vibration to a microfluidic chip having microstructures on its surface. By applying a rectilinear vibration to a chip with a micropillar array, a localized flow pattern to trap single motile cells are generated around the micropillars. We succeeded in a parallel trapping of single Euglena (size is approximately 50-100 μm) by using the proposed method. Furthermore, we demonstrated one application of the method for an evaluation of motility of motile cells with a single cell level.