Medaka embryo development monitoring using differential electrical impedance spectroscopy

A medaka embryo development monitoring method using differential Electrical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) is proposed. Impedance difference between measurement system with and without embryo is innovatively introduced to analyze embryo's development. Electrical characteristics of embryo are extracted from differential EIS. The proposed method has merits of eliminating the effect of electrical double layer (EDL) between electrodes and suspension. Besides relaxation frequency and its corresponding real/imaginary values of embryo, relaxation models and their fitting parameters are also extracted as properties of embryo in different developmental stages. In simulation, models of medaka embryo in 13 developmental stages from zygote stage to hatching stage are built, the extracted electrical characteristics reflect morphological and physiological changes of embryo well. In experiment, the proposed method is used to monitor medaka embryo's development from neurula stage to hatching stage. It also show that the electrical characteristics reflect physiological properties of embryo sensitively.