Cell-based microfluidic assays in translational medicine

Abstract

Microfluidics is the study and use of fluid flow at small volumes (typically microliter and below). Microfluidic principles have great potential utility in many engineering and medical arenas, including point-of-care diagnostics tests. The home pregnancy test is an early example of a microfluidic diagnostic assay that utilized a colorimetric readout to detect human chorionic gonadotropin. More recently, microfluidics has been used to study and quantify cellular characteristics. Two areas where microfluidic cell-based assays have been used for clinical applications are chemotaxis (gradient-dependent cell migration) and the isolation and analysis of rare cells such as circulating tumor cells. This chapter will review current translational research studies, integrating microfluidics with chemotaxis and rare cell analysis, as well as future research directions in these emerging fields.