Assaying tumor cells shed into bodily fluids offers the potential for non-invasive detection and analysis of cancerous tissue. Despite remarkable technological advances in sensitive detection and enumeration of rare tumor cells admixed with other cells, recovery of those tumor cells at their native state, amenable for further analysis, remains a challenge. Here, we introduce a sacrificial microdevice manufactured out of hydrogel that retains its structure only when needed, i.e., while screening a sample to isolate tumor cells, and subsequently dissolves to leave behind intact tumor cells for analysis.
Using this technology, we isolated tumor cells from different samples including clinical ones collected from patients with metastatic prostate and ovarian cancers as well as medulloblastoma, and successfully subjected isolated tumor cells to immunocytochemical, functional, and molecular assays. Inconspicuous technologies for liquid biopsy will enable artifact-free, comprehensive analysis of tumor cells by natively integrating with other cytology and molecular assays.
Tevhide Ozkaya-Ahmadov received B.Sc. and M.S. degrees from Fatih University, Istanbul, Turkey, in 2006 and 2008, respectively, and Ph.D. degree from University of Cincinnati in 2016, all in Chemistry.
Her Ph.D. research mainly focused on nanomaterial, sensing and photodynamic therapy. Dr. Ozkaya Ahmadov is currently working as a postdoctoral research fellow in Biomedical Microsystems Laboratory at Georgia Tech School of Electric and Computer Engineering. Her research interests are developing sensors for isolation of circulating tumor cells and nanomaterial-based microfluidic systems with applications in point-of-care diagnostics and therapeutics.