Abstract
Efficient and effective separation of circulating tumor cells from biological samples to promote early diagnosis of cancer is important but challenging, especially for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). In this article, a Y-Y shaped microfluidic device was designed to isolate NSCLC cells with a dielectrophoresis approach. Numerical simulations were conducted that the trajectories of cells were traced by solving the electric potential distribution and the flow field in a microchannel. The effects of inlet flow rate ratio of blood sample and buffer on separation performance were studied and optimized by the numerical investigation. Under optimal operating conditions, the separation efficiency can reach around 99%, which is achieved with 100 kHz AC, electrodes potential ranging from 1.6 V to 2.2 V, and flow rate ratio from 1.9 to 2.5. This study presents a potentially efficient, facile and low-cost route for circulating tumor cell separation.
Highlights
Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are tumor cells shedding from the solid tumor, entering into the bloodstream, surviving in the circulating system, and traveling to distant organs, which resulting in metastasis
This study presents a potential route for an efficient, relatively simple and low-cost method for circulating tumor cells separation
In this study, the separation performance of the DEP-assisted microfluidic method is evaluated by exploring the trajectories of five kinds of NSCLC (HOP-62, HOP-92, NCIH226, NCI-H23, and EKVX) in channel, accompanied by erythrocytes as a control group
Summary
Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are tumor cells shedding from the solid tumor, entering into the bloodstream, surviving in the circulating system, and traveling to distant organs, which resulting in metastasis. A magnetic force gradient based microfluidic chip was developed to separate CTCs depending on their expression level of EpCAM.[8] This method is of prognostic value in patients with solid tumors, such as advanced breast, colon, and prostate cancer, while its poor sensitivity for non-small lung cancer (NSCLC) restricts the utilization in treatment.[9] Physical separation methods such as morphology-based microfilter, and density gradient centrifugation methods have advantages of simple operation, maintaining cell integrity and no need for expensive antibodies Such methods are limited by the low specificity and high false positive. Where εr denotes the relative permittivity, σ denotes the electrical conductivity, and ω is the angular frequency of the electric field
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