3D position and orientation control method of micro object by dielectrophoresis

It is important to be able to manipulate a biological small object, such as a cell and embryo. For the anatomical operation, it is necessary to fix the object in solution to reduce the work load of the operator. Here, we propose the bio-aligner, which can control position and orientation of the object and fix it firmly even if the external force is applied, and release it fast. To realize the bio-aligner, we tried the dielectrophoretic force to control external force to the object. We carried out a FEM analysis and implemented a prototype bio-aligner. We performed preliminary experiments to show the effectiveness of the proposed method.