Application of microfluidic technology in detection of circulating tumor cells / 中华检验医学杂志

ABSTRACT

The early diagnosis of cancer is aimed at intervention, as far as possible in the early stage of the treatment of cancer, thereby reducing the suffering and economic burden of the patient. Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are tumor cells that fall from the malignant tumor into the circulatory system and form cancer metastasis when they migrate to distant organs. The detection and identification of CTCs is important for the study, monitoring and intervention of cancer metastasis processes. However, the amount of CTCs in the blood is extremely rare, and the environment in the blood is complex, which poses a huge technical challenge for its screening and analysis. Various methods have been developed to enrich CTCs from blood samples of cancer patients. Among them, microfluidic technology has great advantages in the field of CTC detection.