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Updated: May 17, 2026
Label-free Isolation and Enrichment of Cells Through Contactless Dielectrophoresis
Published on: September 3, 2013
Sperm cells manipulation employing dielectrophoresis
E Rosales-Cruzaley1, P A Cota-Elizondo, D Sánchez
1Biophysics of Ion Channels and Nanotechnology Laboratory and Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del IPN (CINVESTAV) Unidad Monterrey, 66600, Apodaca, NL, Mexico.
Abstract:
Infertility studies are an important growing field, where new methods for the manipulation, enrichment and selection of sperm cells are required. Microfluidic techniques offer attractive advantages such as requirement of low sample volume and short processing times in the range of second or minutes. Presented here is the application of insulator-based dielectrophoresis (iDEP) for the enrichment and separation of mature and spermatogenic cells by employing a microchannel with cylindrical insulating structures with DC electric potentials in the range of 200-1500 V. The results demonstrated that iDEP has the potential to concentrate sperm cells and distinguish between mature and spermatogenic cells by exploiting the differences in shape which lead to differences in electric polarization. Viability assessments revealed that a significant percentage of the cells are viable after the dielectrophoretic treatment, opening the possibility for iDEP to be developed as a tool in infertility studies.
