An impulse response flow cytometric technique for blood cell characterisation-instrumentation and preliminary evaluation

Abstract

A new technique for studying the properties of blood and other cells has been developed. It is based on measurement of the continuous electrical impedance spectrum of individual cells. The cellular impedance is obtained by applying an impulse and recording the impulse response while a stream of cells suspended in an electrolyte pass through a measurement aperture in a single file. Preliminary evaluation has demonstrated that the instrument prototype is capable of detecting characteristic spectra of different cell populations. This paper presents some theoretical aspects of the technique, an outline of the instrumentation design and preliminary experimental results.