Biosensors for single-cell mechanical characterization

Cell mechanical phenotyping has been brought to the fore as an intrinsic biophysical label-free marker with indispensable merits. This chapter discusses the current understanding of the origins of cell mechanical response and illustrates how cell mechanical responses indicate cell state and diseases. Over decades, cell mechanics have never stopped attracting the attention of researchers, and new techniques keep emerging to address challenges. We will go through these techniques, discuss the advantages, limitations, and improvements. Three microfluidics-based methods consisting of constriction deformability cytometry, shear flow deformability cytometry, and extensional flow deformability cytometry are highlighted as next-generation mechanical phenotyping assessment tools. Methods and applications under each class are enumerated. They demonstrate a high diversity, high informativeness, rich merits of microfluidics-based approaches to inspire future research.