A new approach for separation of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in the microfluidics to enhance the capture purity with COMSOL simulation

Abstract

Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) is considered as the indicator of primary cancer of patient since CTCs escape from the primary cancer. The separation and subsequent molecular analysis of CTCs are required to diagnosis, treatment and development of the new drug and biomarker. The microfluidic based separation technology is continuously developed, because of the advantages of microfluidics such as easy handling, low-cost fabrication and integration with optical or electrical systems. The size based hydrodynamic separation technology, especially multi-orifice flow fractionation (MOFF) can offer the high throughout, the high cell viability with labelling process. Also this microfluidic system can isolate CTCs with almost 100% of the capture efficiency, but near to 0% of the capture purity. The problem is the size overlap between a leukocytes and CTCs. The deformability of the cells actually affects to the separation process, however, the deformability of cells is not discussed. To enhance the capture purity, the deformability should be considered, because the cell deformability affects to the result. In this research, the trajectories of rigid and deformable particles are analyzed using COMSOL simulation. In result, the deformability parameter affects to the change of trajectories of rigid and deformable particles. Moreover the increased fluid velocity and the number of stage enhanced the gap of the trajectories of two types of particles, it should be considered to improve the capture purity as well as the cell size. ⓒ 2015 DGIST