A new way to make, move and immobilise complex functional microstructures using a combination of multiphoton polymerisation and optical trapping in water has been devised by researchers in the US.
The technique can create structures, for example microbraids, that are unattainable using conventional fabrication techniques. The team could create and manipulate microthreads from different materials that will enable a wide range of biophysical and biochemical studies on individual cells, they say.
Link to journal article
Simultaneous Microscale Optical Manipulation, Fabrication and Immobilisation in Aqueous Media
Farah Dawood, Sijia Qin, Linjie Li, Emily Y. Lin and John T Fourkas
Chem. Sci., 2012, Accepted Manuscript, DOI: 10.1039/C2SC20351K
