A microfluidic device for physical trapping and electrical lysis of bacterial cells

In this letter, we report a simple microfluidic device that integrates the capture of bacterial cells using a microscale bead array and the rapid electrical lysis for release of intracellular materials. We study the retention of Escherichia coli cells with different concentrations in this type of bead array and the optimal electrical parameters for the electroporative release of intracellular proteins. Our design provides a simple solution to the extraction of intracellular materials from a bacterial cell population based entirely on physical methods without applying chemical or biological reagents. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.