Themed collection Personalised Medicine: Liquid Biopsy

Thought leaders Stefanie Jeffrey and Mehmet Toner introduce the Lab on a Chip Personalised Medicine: Liquid Biopsy thematic collection.

This review examines scientific advancements of microfluidic technology for engineering exosomes and assesses future applications and perspectives in developing precision therapeutics, which can serve the community by identifying potential new research areas or technologies that are urgently needed in precision therapeutics.

Substantial research has been devoted to elucidate the roles that extracellular vesicles (EVs) play in the regulation of both normal and pathological processes, and multiple studies have demonstrated their potential as a source of cancer biomarkers.

Research on circulating biomarkers have enabled the development of new diagnostic tools that complement conventional biopsies through less invasive sampling of the tumor cells, also known as liquid biopsy.

New technologies that measure sparse molecular biomarkers from easily accessible bodily fluids (e.g. blood, urine, and saliva) are revolutionizing disease diagnostics and precision medicine.

Opportunities and challenges in translational application of ctDNA along with recent developments in chip-based ctDNA detection technologies have been reviewed.

Breakthroughs in adapting microfluidic systems for exosome isolation, detection, and analysis are providing new tools to revolutionize personalized medicine.

This article reviews recent advances of new assay platforms that are developed to facilitate molecular analyses of exosomes.

A microfluidics-enabled strategy for the controllable synthesis of immunomagnetic nanomaterials was developed, and the shape-dependent screening efficiency of CTCs was investigated.

Rare CTC clusters can be purified intact from large blood volumes with a continuous three-stage non-equilibrium inertial separation array (NISA).

A monolithic 3D-printed microfluidic device integrated with stacked layers of functionalized leukodepletion channels and microfiltration for the negative enrichment of circulating tumor cells directly from clinically relevant volumes of whole blood.

To sequence single circulating tumor cells (CTCs) from whole blood, a microfluidic chip was developed to perform blood filtering/CTC enrichment/CTC sorting and in situ MDA for whole genome sequencing.

Integrated ferrohydrodynamic cell separation (iFCS) explores cell magnetization in biocompatible ferrofluids and enriches CTCs in an antigen-independent and cell size variation-inclusive manner.

Here we presented a set-up which can be used to capture cancer cells in continues flow fusing a functionalized surface.

We present an ultra-sensitive, novel liquid biopsy approach which can uniquely enable detection of CTCs using genetic markers without pre-enrichment.

We present a novel cancer marker-free CTC enrichment method by size-based filtration and immunomagnetic negative selection followed by dielectrophoretic concentration for direct detection of genetic mutations in rare cancer cells suspended in whole blood.

We report an integrated multi-molecular sensor (IMMS) platform for an entire sample-to-answer protocol encompassing melanoma cell capture in biological fluids, on-chip cell lysis, and combined quantification of intracellular BRAF^V600E DNA and protein amounts.

A new integrated microfluidic system was developed for automatic detection and enumeration of CTCs with field-effect transistors (FETs).

This microfluidic platform captures and analyzes rare molecules, such as cell-free DNA in liquid biopsies, to establish new epigenetic insights.

A dielectrophoretic chip has been developed for extracellular vesicle (EV) isolation, which facilitates high-recovery efficiency (>83%) and high-purity EV isolation from plasma.

The developed high-throughput liquid biopsy platform for rare tumor cell separation from body fluids has shown enormous promise in cancer detection and prognosis monitoring.

Detection of AR-V7 in urinary EVs provides a simple and promising liquid biopsy tool for patients with prostate cancer.

A microwell-patterned microfluidic digital mRNA analysis platform enables PCR-free, single-molecule detection of EWS-FLI1 fusion transcripts in EVs towards liquid biopsy-based non-invasive diagnosis of Ewing Sarcoma.

Here, we report a label-free method based on acoustic impedance contrast for the isolation of CTCs from peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) in a microchannel using acoustophoresis. Applying this method, we demonstrate the label-free isolation of HeLa and MDA-MB-231 cells from PBMCs.

Automated magnetic bead sample preparation platform for positive/negative cell selection and molecular endpoints.

Label-free, size-dependent, and high-throughput isolation of rare tumor cells from untreated whole blood is enabled by interfacial viscoelastic microfluidics.

Plastic microfluidic device for the efficient isolation (>90% recovery) of cell free DNA from plasma for molecular profiling.

An elution technique selectively captures and releases intact, label-free exosomes from a microfluidic device for characterizing ovarian cancer serum.

Improved reproducibility in seed particle mediated acoustic trapping of submicron particles enables clinical biomarker studies in extracellular vesicles.

We proposed a FETAL-Chip for efficient enrichment of cNRBCs, which offers great potential for NIPD.

Magnetic ranking cytometry profiles dynamic phenotypes in CTCs that are linked to metastatic potential.

Single CTC sequencing workflow using biophysical enrichment and single cell isolation by laser capture microdissection.

Fully integrated lab-on-a-disc for cfDNA isolation allows real-time monitoring of tumor mutation status during targeted therapy.

A new CTC isolation approach uncovers special populations of platelet-coated CTCs and CTC-leukocyte clusters in cancer patients.

We have developed a microchip platform that combines fast, magnetic micropore based negative selection (>10 mL h⁻¹) with rapid on-chip in situ RNA profiling.

A size-based ferrohydrodynamic cell separation (FCS) device capable of enriching intact circulating tumor cells with high throughput and high recovery rate.

A wide distribution of cell sizes can be selectively captured by tuning the flow rate in a micro-vortex flow.