Magnetically Sculpted Microfluidics for Continuous-Flow Fractionation of Cell Populations by EpCAM Expression Level.

ABSTRACT: Continuous-flow separation of magnetically labeled cells according to surface-marker expression levels is increasingly needed to study phenotypic heterogeneity and support downstream assays. Here, we present a microfluidic platform that uses spatially engineered soft magnetic strips (SMS) to sculpt lateral magnetic deflection fields for quantitative, label-guided cell fractionation. Under a uniform bias field, the SMS generates controllable magnetic gradients within the microchannel, producing distinct lateral velocities among EpCAM-labeled tumor cells that carry different Dynabead loads, which indirectly report membrane protein expression. Multi-outlet collection converts these "race-based" trajectory differences into discrete expression-level-resolved fractions. A COMSOL-MATLAB framework

SUBMITTER: Liang Z 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12844116 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature