Electrorotation is the circular movement of an electrically polarized particle. Similar to the slip of an

electric motor An electric motor is an electrical machine that converts electrical energy into mechanical energy. Most electric motors operate through the interaction between the motor's magnetic field and electric current in a wire winding to generate forc ...

, it can arise from a

phase lag In the aerodynamics of rotorcraft like helicopters, phase lag refers to the angular difference between the point at which a control input to a rotor blade occurs and the point of maximum displacement of the blade in response to that control input ...

between an applied rotating electric field and the respective relaxation processes and may thus be used to investigate the processes or, if these are known or can be accurately described by models, to determine particle properties. The method is popular in

cellular Cellular may refer to: *Cellular automaton, a model in discrete mathematics *Cell biology, the evaluation of cells work and more *Cellular (film), ''Cellular'' (film), a 2004 movie *Cellular frequencies, assigned to networks operating in cellular ...

biophysics Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that applies approaches and methods traditionally used in physics to study biological phenomena. Biophysics covers all scales of biological organization, from molecular to organismic and populations. ...

, as it allows measuring cellular properties like

conductivity Conductivity may refer to: *Electrical conductivity, a measure of a material's ability to conduct an electric current **Conductivity (electrolytic), the electrical conductivity of an electrolyte in solution ** Ionic conductivity (solid state), ele ...

and

permittivity In electromagnetism, the absolute permittivity, often simply called permittivity and denoted by the Greek letter ''ε'' ( epsilon), is a measure of the electric polarizability of a dielectric. A material with high permittivity polarizes more i ...

cellular compartment Cellular compartments in cell biology comprise all of the closed parts within the cytosol of a eukaryotic cell, usually surrounded by a single or double lipid layer membrane. These compartments are often, but not always, defined as membrane-b ...

s and their surrounding

membranes A membrane is a selective barrier; it allows some things to pass through but stops others. Such things may be molecules, ions, or other small particles. Membranes can be generally classified into synthetic membranes and biological membranes. Bi ...

See also