Joel Voldman on microfluidic manipulation of cells and their environment

Recently I ran across a video of my former advisor at MIT, Joel Voldman, speaking as part of the 2008 CIMIT Summer Education Series: Frontiers of Microfluidics and Microsystems in Biomedical Sciences and Clinical Medicine. In the video below (and available directly from CIMIT here), Joel highlights his group’s work using microfluidic technology and BioMEMS to manipulate cells and their environment, including:

• Isolating and sorting cells based on complex phenotypes
• Sorting cells based on electrical properties
• Using a microfluidic cell fusion device to study reprogramming via cell pairing
• Using microfluidic perfusion to modulate the diffusible environment (My thesis work and the work of Katarina Blagovic — segment begins around 30:22)

I feel lucky to have been a part of the group and look forward to seeing what direction the research takes in the future. For more about work in the Voldman group, see:

• Voldman group research page, including publications, most downloadable as free PDFs
• New York Times article on Alison Skelley’s microfluidic device for cell fusion

Also, be sure to check out the other talks in the CIMIT series — together they provide a terrific overview of several types of current microfluidics/lab-on-a-chip work.

Related posts:

1. Dec 1st CIMIT Forum: Life Science Innovation
2. Microfluidics for studying cancer metastasis
3. Recent clinical trials of microfluidic devices
4. Worth a thousand words
5. Agresti talk on drop-based microfluidic screening