Biophysical Micro- and Nano-Actuators

Dear Colleagues,

Biological actuations are defined as physical stimulation (e.g., mechanical, electrical, etc.) techniques to control or change the cell or molecular activities. Recent advances of micro- and nanotechnologies have received significant attention from researchers for the development of novel biological actuation techniques for various in vitro and in vivo life science applications, including, but not limited to, rare cell isolation, separation of macromolecules, such as DNA, RNA, and proteins from a sample, cell Lysis, precise localization of cells for microscopic purposes, enhancing the sensitivity of biosensors by manipulating the labeled cells/molecules toward recognition element (e.g., Antibody, DNA, Aptemer), opening the blood brain barrier (BBB) for drug delivery, creating pores in the cell membrane for molecular transfection, cell stimulation using various physical factors for stem cell differentiation and tissue engineering, and neural cell stimulation. To date, many biophysical techniques, such as Dielectrophoresis (DEP), Electrophoresis, Electroporation, magnetic cellular manipulation using micro-beads or magnetic nano-particles, optical tweezers, patch-clamping methods, MRI-guided nanoparticles for crossing BBB, and ultrasonic techniques for crossing BBB have been applied.

This Special Issue targets the recent progress, including simulation, modeling and experimental works, on the following topics:

1. DEP manipulation for cell separation, levitation, trapping, etc.
2. Magnetic manipulation using magnetic/super-paramagnetic micro-beads or nano-particles
3. Ultrasound manipulation for cell separation
4. Ultrasound manipulation for opening BBB
5. MRI-guided drug delivery toward the target tissue in the body
6. Electroporation to deliver small or large molecules into cells
7. Mechanical stimulation cells for tissue engineering
8. Electrical Excitation of neural cells for neuroscience studies
9. Electrophoresis for molecular separation in microfluidic devices
10. Optogenetic actuators for controlling cellular activities
11. Thermal Stimulation of cells
12. Other biological actuation techniques

Dr. Ebrahim Ghafar-Zadeh
Guest Editor

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