One-dimensional jumping optical tweezers for optical stretching of bi-concave human red blood cells

Opt Express. 2008 Feb 4;16(3):1996-2004. doi: 10.1364/oe.16.001996.

Abstract

We report the experimental demonstration of optical stretching of individual bio-concave human red blood cells (RBCs) with one-dimensional jumping optical tweezers. We trapped a RBC in isotonic buffer solution in a conventional stationary single-beam gradient-force optical trap and discretely scanned the trapping beam with an acousto-optic modulator such that the focal point of the trapping beam jumped back-and-forth between two fixed points. At the jumping frequency on the order of a 100 Hz and higher, and the jumping distance in the range of a few microns, the bi-concave RBC was stably trapped and stretched. The elongation of the stretched RBC was measured as a function of the beam-scanning amplitude, and the experimental results were explained qualitatively by a theoretical model.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Cells, Cultured
  • Computer Simulation
  • Elasticity
  • Humans
  • Micromanipulation / methods*
  • Models, Cardiovascular*
  • Optical Tweezers*
  • Stress, Mechanical