Dielectrophoretic analysis of microbes in water

Traditional microbiological methods are still used extensively for analysis of micro-organisms in water. However, they are inefficient due to a high labour input requirement, a low sample capacity, and often a long time lag before results are available. Analytical stages involving incubation and growth (enrichments and colony isolation) contribute the greatest delay in reporting, although subsequent identification can also be protracted. The use of electrometric growth analysers (measuring impedance, conductance or capacitance changes) is now more common in water microbiology. Although these instruments can provide more rapid results and provide increased handling capacity, the bacterial generation times required to provide detectable changes cause delays and suitable selective media are not fully developed for all microbes of interest. Most other recent methods have equally disappointing drawbacks and thus extensive research continues in order to realise the ambition of 'real-time' analytical microbiology. Several research groups have demonstrated the potential of dielectrophoresis in providing microbial concentration, separation and identification systems which are not limited by bacterial growth and are therefore extremely rapid. Dielectrophoresis occurs when cells are placed in non-uniform electric fields. The cells move towards the electrodes (regardless of the direction of the applied field) as determined by their dielectric properties (conductivity and permittivity) rather than by their charge as occurs in electrophoresis. Also, the polarisability of the cells, and therefore the polarity and magnitude of the dielectrophoretic force, varies as a function of the electric field frequency. Because the dielectric properties of a particular cell type have characteristic frequency-dependent components, if cell collection at electrodes is observed across a frequency range, the collection spectrum produced is distinctive for the cell type under investigation. This can be exploited for analytical and separation applications in microbiology. This paper will describe rapid analytical techniques based on electrokinetic phenomena under research and development at York. These include dielectrophoretic enrichment, concentration and characterisation systems for the analysis of water bacteria and protozoa.