Electrical monitoring of blood cells mechanical disorders
Our group has the experience of the fabrication od devices for the mechanical and electrical sensing of the rigidity of red blood cells. Genetic diseases like the sickle cell disease or spherocytosis disease, or infectious diseases like malaria, affect the rigidity of the red blood cells. Microfluidic devices that mimick the red blood cell micro-circulation, or the spleen filtering functions, can be fabricated, and are capable to characterize and discrimitate the different levels of the disease. Devices involve fluidic restrictions similar that the one that can be found in vivo, and might be equipped with micro-electrodes in order to electrically monitor the behaviour of healthy or sick cells.