Measurement and comparison of dielectric properties of human pancreatic tumours, healthy tissues and porcine tissues ex vivo between 1Hz and 1MHz.

The dielectric properties of pancreatic tissues from human healthy and tumour-bearing tissues have been extracted from impedance measurement on ex vivo, freshly excised samples. They are compared to pig pancreas samples, measured following the same protocol. The purpose is to add data to the scarce literature on the properties of the human pancreas and pancreatic tumours, for treatment planning, tissue identification and numerical simulations.

Integrated platform for culture, observation, and parallelized electroporation of spheroids.

Reversible electroporation is a method to introduce molecules into cells by increasing the permeability of their membranes, thanks to the application of pulsed electric fields. One of its main biomedical applications is electro-chemotherapy, where electroporation is used to deliver anticancer drugs into tumor tissues. To improve our understanding of the electroporation effect on tissues and select efficient treatments, tumor models are needed.

Eukaryotic Cell Capture by Amplified Magnetic Hybridization Using Yeast as a Model.

A non-destructive approach based on magnetic hybridization (MISH) and hybridization chain reaction (HCR) for the specific capture of eukaryotic cells has been developed. As a prerequisite, a HCR-MISH procedure initially used for tracking bacterial cells was here adapted for the first time to target eukaryotic cells using a universal eukaryotic probe, Euk-516R. Following labeling with superparamagnetic nanoparticles, cells from the model eukaryotic microorganism were hybridized and isolated on a micro-magnet array.

Dielectrophoretic cell trapping for improved surface plasmon resonance imaging sensing.

The performance of conventional surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensors can be limited by the diffusion of the target analyte to the sensor surface. This work presents an SPR biosensor that incorporates an active mass-transport mechanism based on dielectrophoresis and electroosmotic flow to enhance analyte transport to the sensor surface and reduce the time required for detection. Both these phenomena rely on the generation of AC electric fields that can be tailored by shaping the electrodes that also serve as the SPR sensing areas.

Performance improvement of plasmonic sensors using a combination of AC electrokinetic effects for (bio)target capture.

Analytes concentration techniques are being developed with the appealing expectation to boost the performance of biosensors. One promising method lies in the use of electrokinetic forces. We present hereafter a new design for a microstructured plasmonic sensor which is obtained by conventional microfabrication techniques, and which can easily be adapted on a classical surface plasmon resonance imaging (SPRI) system without further significant modification.