ABSTRACT
Following its success in information technology, photonics has signi„cantly facilitated research in life science and biology in recent years. As a result, a new area, biophotonics, has emerged and is under fast development. The term biophotonics refers to an interdisciplinary subject at the interface between biology and photonics. This emerging subject mainly deals with the interaction between light and biological quantities with a particular focus on the biomedical applications of featured optical technologies such as optical microscopy, spectroscopy, biosensing or diagnostics, monitoring, and manipulation. Among the wide range of impacts that photonics have had in the last several decades, one of the most signi„cant advances is the applications of optical forces such as optical trapping, manipulation, and sorting of biological objects. These applications enable us to explore the dynamics of single molecules, kinetics of molecular biochemical reactions, and cell mechanics, which have extensively advanced our fundamental understandings of many biological events at the single-molecule level and/or at the single-cell level. In addition to the fundamental research, many practical applications can be exploited by integration of optical trapping or optical sorting into biomedical devices such as lab-on-a-chip and biomicroelectromechanical systems (BioMEMS).
