US Patent 9778400 System and method for manipulation of particles

A system and method suitable for selection, manipulation, and analysis of individual particles within a fluid medium. The system and method involve manipulating the particles by contacting the fluid medium with a plasmonic nanoantenna, illuminating the plasmonic nanoantenna with a source of light such that the plasmonic nanoantenna acts as a nanoscale heat source resulting in localized heating of the fluid medium creating local gradients in the electrical properties of the fluid medium that yield plasmonic trapping sites in the vicinity of the plasmonic nanoantenna, and applying an alternating current electric field in the fluid medium to create electrothermoplasmonic flow around the plasmonic nanoantenna. The electrothermoplasmonic flow transports at least one of the particles towards the plasmonic nanoantenna and the particle is trapped by at least one of the plasmonic trapping sites.