Capillary transport in photonic crystal fibers: harnessing the lattice Boltzmann method for innovative 3T3 cell transport simulations

Leveraging the established principles of microfluidic technology presents an exciting frontier for assisting cell manipulation and analytical tools within photonic crystal fiber (PCF) designs. This strategy exploits the strong foundation of microfluidic dynamics to advance the emergent field of biosensing and cellular control using PCFs. We analyzed the effects of cellular membrane deformation on the capillary transport in a PCF hollow channel. The lateral migration of particles in response to fluid interactions describes these effects. We used the lateral migration velocity (v→lift) results from a lattice Boltzmann method simulation to compare the microfluidic transport behavior of three deformable particles and 3T3 cells in channels of the PCF. The migration velocities of 8-μm radius simulated deformable particles confined to a rectangular channel with a height of 50 μm were compared with those of 9- and 10-μm radii 3T3 cells suspended within round channels of the PCF with a diameter of H=22 μm. The v→lift results for the 3T3 cell transport agreed with our image microscopy observations, where the v→lift caused the 3T3 cells to adhere to specific regions within the PCF channel. The outcomes of our study indicate that for a deformable particle or cell of any radii to be effectively transported without rupturing cells or adhering to channel walls, the center of the cell must remain within a range of H relative to the centerline of the PCF channel. Specifically, for 3T3 cells with a flow rate of ≈0.3 μL/min, this range was determined to be ±40% of the H value. Employing v→lift to model mammalian cell transport in PCF capillary channels would benefit particle separation applications in PCFs.