Digital holographic (DH) microscopy is a promising technique for quantitative phase contrast imaging. It provides complex amplitude of the object wavefront, which in turn yields the thickness distribution of the object. An added advantage of the technique is its ability for numerical focusing, which provides the thickness distribution of the object at different axial planes. In this invited paper, we present an overview of our reported work on two beam DH microscopyto acquire different cell parameters for cell imaging and automated cell identification. Applications to automated monitoring of stem cells without destroying the cells and automated identification of malaria infected red blood cells are discussed.