Magnetic Control of Lateral Migration of Ellipsoidal Microparticles in Microscale Flows

Precise manipulations of nonspherical microparticles by shape have diverse applications in biology and biomedical engineering. Here, we study lateral migration of ellipsoidal paramagnetic microparticles in low-Reynolds-number flows under uniform magnetic fields. We show that magnetically induced torque alters the rotation dynamics of the particle and results in shape-dependent lateral migration. By adjusting the direction of the magnetic field, we demonstrate versatile control of the symmetric and asymmetric rotation of the particles, thereby controlling the direction of the particle's lateral migration. The particle rotations are experimentally measured, and their symmetry or asymmetry characteristics agree well with the prediction from a simple theory. The lateral migration mechanism is found to be valid for nonmagnetic particles suspended in a ferrofluid. Finally, we demonstrate shape-based sorting of microparticles by exploiting the proposed migration mechanism.