Der optical stretcher — kontaktfreie Messung der Zellmechanik

Abstract

The optical stretcher, developed in our lab, is a technology to contact-free measure cellular mechanical properties with a through-put of several hundred cells per hour. Even without any biomolecular information, our approach clearly shows that the deformation of cells reflects enough information to distinguish different cell types and detect aging effects. Furthermore, three clinical studies on oral, breast and cervix carcinoma clearly show that tumor cells are softer and deform more than normal cells.