Label-free microfluidic chip and AI identify blood-borne tumor cells

Finding a few tumor cells hidden among billions of blood cells is one of the biggest challenges in liquid biopsy.

A chip that separates tumor cells by size Most current approaches for isolating CTCs rely on molecular markers found on tumor-cell surfaces.

The chip uses these differences to guide tumor cells and blood cells into separate flow paths, allowing tumor cells to be collected without relying on specific surface markers.

In artificial blood samples containing MCF-7 breast cancer cells and white blood cells, tumor cells were enriched at the central outlet, while most blood cells were directed toward the side outlets.

AI helps identify tumor cells without fluorescent staining Separating tumor cells is only half of the challenge.