Lab on Chip Microfluidic Sensor for Individual Red Blood Cell Water Permeability Measurement

This paper presents the investigation of a microfluidic lab on a chip sensor for real time red blood cells (RBCs) membrane permeability measurements at the single cell level. The device detects impedances within 0.26 s after mixing with different media, measures impedance values at all ten electrodes at this rate and allows tracking of individual cell volume changes caused by cell osmosis in anisosmotic fluids over a 1.3 s postmixing timespan, facilitating accurate individual cell estimates of water permeability. The device was tested using rat RBCs to evaluate the equilibration volume-osmolality relationship, and to determine membrane water permeability. By using this sensor, we anticipate that this device can be used to evaluate water permeability parameters in cells covering three orders of magnitude in volume.