Immunoaffinity and Filtration for Micro Fluidic Isolation of Cancer Cells

Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) have attracted researchers' attention as they can serve as biomarkers for detecting cancer metastasis and monitoring patients' treatment response. However, the extreme rarity and heterogeneity of CTCs limits the detection of them. Microfluidic technologies have been shown promising for CTC isolation due to their high capture efficiency and selectivity. In this paper, we report a lateral filter array microfluidic (LFAM) system for analysis of sarcoma CTCs. The LFAM system integrates size-based filtration and immunoaffinity capture using antibodies, achieving up to 99.6% capture efficiency. This work shows enhanced CTC detection for liquid biopsy applications, improving cancer prognosis and treatment monitoring.