Active cell capturing for organ-on-a-chip systems: a review

Abstract Organ-on-a-chip (OOC) is an emerging technology that has been proposed as a new powerful cell-based tool to imitate the pathophysiological environment of human organs. For most OOC systems, a pivotal step is to culture cells in microfluidic devices. In active cell capturing techniques, external actuators, such as electrokinetic, magnetic, acoustic, and optical forces, or a combination of these forces, can be applied to trap cells after ejecting cell suspension into the microchannel inlet. This review paper distinguishes the characteristics of biomaterials and evaluates microfluidic technology. Besides, various types of OOC and their fabrication techniques are reported and various active cell capture microstructures are analyzed. Furthermore, their constraints, challenges, and future perspectives are provided.