AN OPTICAL “motor” made from a red blood cell and a laser could have applications as diverse as malaria diagnosis and measuring molecules. It could even be set spinning to unclog blocked arteries, according to its developer, Deepak Mathur of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai, India.
He and his colleagues discovered by accident that they could spin a blood cell while trying to trap it under a laser beam of circularly polarised light. “We wanted to see if we could move the blood cell using the laser when it suddenly started rotating at a tremendous rate,” Mathur…
