We develop a pair of tapered-tip single fiber optical tweezers, and study its multi-trapping characteristic. The finite difference time domain method is employed to simulate the trapping force characteristic of this pair of single fiber optical tweezers, and the results show that the number of trapped particles depends on the refractive index and the size of the particles. The trapping force of this pair of tapered-tip single fiber optical tweezers is calibrated by the experimental method, and the experimental results are consistent with the theoretical calculation results. The multi-trapping capability realized by the tapered-tip single fiber optical tweezers will be practical and useful for applications in biomedical research fields.
The ability to arrange cells and/or microparticles into the desired pattern is critical in biological, chemical, and metamaterial studies and other applications. Researchers have developed a variety of patterning techniques, which either have a limited capacity to simultaneously trap massive particles or lack the spatial resolution necessary to manipulate individual particle. Several approaches have been proposed that combine both high spatial selectivity and high throughput simultaneously. However, those methods are complex and difficult to fabricate. In this article, we propose and demonstrate a simple method that combines the laser-induced convection flow and fiber-based optical trapping methods to perform both regular and special spatial shaping arrangement. Essentially, we combine a light field with a large optical intensity gradient distribution and a thermal field with a large temperature gradient distribution to perform the microparticles shaping arrangement. The tapered-fiber-based laser-induced convection flow provides not only the batch manipulation of massive particles, but also the finer manipulation of special one or several particles, which break out the limit of single-fiber-based massive/individual particles photothermal manipulation. The combination technique allows for microparticles quick accumulation, single-layer and multilayer arrangement; special spatial shaping arrangement/adjustment, and microparticles sorting.
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