title: Lab on a fabric: Mass producible and low-cost fabric filters for the high-throughput viable isolation of circulating tumor cells.
abstract: Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) play an important role in estimating the presence and the metastatic relapse of tumor. Despite of their importance, isolation of viable CTCs is still struggling, since chemical or mechanical damages are unavoidable when separating less than 1000 of CTCs out of billions of other blood components. Furthermore, the current CTC isolation devices show low productivity, since they are produced after a series of complicated fabrication processes. Here, we present a low-cost and mass-producible fabric filters for the viable CTC isolation and the further molecular assay for profiling cancer-associated markers. The fabric filter, produced by polyester monofilament yarns, can be massively produced at extremely low-cost, by showing productivity of ~22filters/s at ~59filters/USD. By utilizing size-based sorting method, the fabric filter is capable to isolate both epithelial and mesenchymal CTCs, while slots with curved walls are beneficial for preventing the cell rupture by reducing 21.6% of mechanical stress compared to the conventional straight-walled slots. We applied our filter to 11 human blood samples and found that the number of CTCs was closely related to the expression level of Ki-67, which is highly overexpressed in proliferative tumors. The fabric filter might be an appropriate caner-screening tool in developing countries, where people suffer from insufficient healthcare services.
authors.affiliation: Department of Bio and Brain Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 34141, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Jiyoon
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Bu
authors.affiliation: Department of Bio and Brain Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 34141, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Yoon-Tae
authors.initials: YT
authors.lastname: Kang
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 34141, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Yong-Seok
authors.initials: YS
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Se Hong Trading, 42-276, Ihyeon-dong, Seo-gu, Daegu 41754, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Jeongsuk
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Department of Bio and Brain Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 34141, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: nanosys@kaist.ac.kr.
authors.forename: Young-Ho
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Cho
authors.affiliation: College of Medicine, Ewha Womans University and Ewha Medical Research Institute, 911-1, MokDong, YangCheon-Ku, Seoul 07985, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Byung-In
authors.initials: BI
authors.lastname: Moon
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D015374:Biosensing Techniques / Q000295:instrumentation; D002469:Cell Separation / Q000295:instrumentation*; D004867:Equipment Design; D005374:Filtration / Q000295:instrumentation*; D006801:Humans; D019394:Ki-67 Antigen / Q000032:analysis; D008875:Middle Aged; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000097:blood / Q000473:pathology; D009360:Neoplastic Cells, Circulating / Q000473:pathology*; D013784:Textiles / Q000032:analysis
chemical_list: D019394:Ki-67 Antigen
keywords: Cancer clinical study; Circulating tumor cells; Fabric filter; Low-cost cancer diagnosis tool; Mass-producible medical device; Viable isolation