Visual capturing and profiling of circulating tumor cells from breast cancer patient’s blood via combining fluorescent IMNPs in a magnet-integrated 3D-printed microfluidic chip.

e13038 Background: Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are considered to be biomarkers of great significance for early metastasis diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment monitoring in breast cancer. However, the detection and profiling phenotypes of CTCs in peripheral blood pose substantial challenges due to their rarity and heterogeneity. Methods: In this study, we leveraged the biological properties of breast cancer CTCs to prepare MUC-1 and cell-surface vimentin (CSV) antibody-functionalized fluorescent immunomagnetic nanoparticles in a common and simple manner, targeting and visually profiling heterogeneous CTCs with high specificity. Concurrently, based on our previous research results, a 3D-printed microfluidic chip based on a magnetic field was designed and fabricated, circumventing the complex and expensive production and operation costs compared to traditional microfluidic devices. Results: Utilizing the chip to enrich breast cancer cell-spiked samples mediated by fluorescent immunomagnetic nanoparticles, a capture rate of over 90% was achieved at the optimal flow rate of 900 μL/min. This system was also employed to detect and analyze the heterogeneity of CTCs in the peripheral blood of 26 patients with various types of breast cancer, with results compared to clinical data. Conclusions: Collectively, characterized by stability, economy, and high efficiency, this system facilitates the heterogeneity research of breast cancer CTCs and holds promise for greater roles in the early diagnosis and personalized treatment of breast cancer patients in the future. Clinical trial information: NCT04239105 .