Sonoporation with single bubbles in microfluidic systems

When bubbles oscillate close to cells in suspension they can cause viable or permanent poration of the cell membrane. This method named as sonoporation offers potentials for novel therapeutic applications in medicine i.e., cell killing or actively induced drug uptake. Until now, the details of bubble-to-cell interactions are not clarified especially due to a lack of experimental methods. Here we show that sonoporation of cells in suspension is made possible and can be studied in details when using a microfluidic system together with laser-induced cavitation bubbles.