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Size‐based cell sorting with a resistive pulse sensor and an electromagnetic pump in a microfluidic chip
Author(s) -
Song Yongxin,
Li Mengqi,
Pan Xinxiang,
Wang Qi,
Li Dongqing
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
electrophoresis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.666
H-Index - 158
eISSN - 1522-2683
pISSN - 0173-0835
DOI - 10.1002/elps.201400292
Subject(s) - microchannel , microfluidics , propidium iodide , cell sorting , sorting , resistive touchscreen , flow cytometry , materials science , computer science , cell , signal (programming language) , lab on a chip , chip , biomedical engineering , nanotechnology , chemistry , apoptosis , biology , engineering , microbiology and biotechnology , computer vision , telecommunications , biochemistry , programmed cell death , programming language
An electrokinetic microfluidic chip is developed to detect and sort target cells by size from human blood samples. Target‐cell detection is achieved by a differential resistive pulse sensor (RPS) based on the size difference between the target cell and other cells. Once a target cell is detected, the detected RPS signal will automatically actuate an electromagnetic pump built in a microchannel to push the target cell into a collecting channel. This method was applied to automatically detect and sort A549 cells and T‐lymphocytes from a peripheral fingertip blood sample. The viability of A549 cells sorted in the collecting well was verified by Hoechst33342 and propidium iodide staining. The results show that as many as 100 target cells per minute can be sorted out from the sample solution and thus is particularly suitable for sorting very rare target cells, such as circulating tumor cells. The actuation of the electromagnetic valve has no influence on RPS cell detection and the consequent cell‐sorting process. The viability of the collected A549 cell is not impacted by the applied electric field when the cell passes the RPS detection area. The device described in this article is simple, automatic, and label‐free and has wide applications in size‐based rare target cell sorting for medical diagnostics.