Dynamic acoustic field for tuneable and scalable particle sorting

Separation of cells is a critical process for studying cell properties, disease diagnostics, and therapeutics. Cell sorting by acoustic waves offers a means to separate cells on the basis of their size and physical properties in a label-free, contactless, and biocompatible manner. In this work, we introduce a unique technique, which use a dynamic acoustic field (DAF), based on the modulation of the phase of the standing wave. Using our dynamic acoustic field, we successfully separated 10 and 45 μm diameter polystyrene particles with a separation efficiency of 100%, and separated 6 and 10 μm polystyrene particles with an efficiency of ~97%. We illustrate that DAF is capable of effectively separating dorsal root ganglion cells from heterogeneous medium. Finally, we demonstrate the scalability of the DAF method by sorting polystyrene particles of 5 mm and 2 mm diameter in air.