Department of Mechanical Engineering and Material Science, Duke University, Durham, NC 27707, USA.
Lab Chip. 2018 Sep 26;18(19):3003-3010. doi: 10.1039/c8lc00434j.
Separation of particles and cells is an important function in many biological and biomedical protocols. Although a variety of microfluidic-based techniques have been developed so far, there is clearly still a demand for a precise, fast, and biocompatible method for separation of microparticles and cells. By combining acoustics and hydrodynamics, we have developed a method which we integrated into three-dimensional acoustofluidic tweezers (3D-AFT) to rapidly and efficiently separate microparticles and cells into multiple high-purity fractions. Compared with other acoustophoresis methods, this 3D-AFT method significantly increases the throughput by an order of magnitude, is label-free and gently handles the sorted cells. We demonstrate not only the separation of 10, 12, and 15 micron particles at a throughput up to 500 μl min-1 using this 3D-AFT method, but also the separation of erythrocytes, leukocytes, and cancer cells. This 3D-AFT method is able to meet various separation demands thus offering a viable alternative with potential for clinical applications.
颗粒和细胞的分离是许多生物和生物医学方案中的重要功能。尽管到目前为止已经开发了各种基于微流控的技术，但显然仍然需要一种精确、快速和生物相容的微颗粒和细胞分离方法。我们结合了声学和流体动力学，开发了一种方法，并将其集成到三维声流镊（3D-AFT）中，以快速有效地将微颗粒和细胞分离成多个高纯度级分。与其他声泳方法相比，这种 3D-AFT 方法的通量提高了一个数量级，并且无需标记，对分选的细胞处理温和。我们不仅展示了使用这种 3D-AFT 方法以高达 500 μl min-1 的流速分离 10、12 和 15 微米的颗粒，还展示了红细胞、白细胞和癌细胞的分离。这种 3D-AFT 方法能够满足各种分离需求，因此为临床应用提供了一种可行的替代方法。
