Benchtop Technologies for Circulating Tumor Cells Separation Based on Biophysical Properties

Table 1

Performance specification of physical based CTCs separation methods.

Method	Target of cancer cell line	CTCs separation efficiency	Cell viability	Purity	Flow rate (whole blood/time)	References
Centrifugation (Ficoll-Hypaque)	Human breast cancer cells (MCF-7)	~46%	—	90%	—	Lara et al. [26]
Centrifugation (OncoQuick)	MCF-7, ZR-75-1, and Hs578T	MCF-7: 57.89%; ZR-75-1: 59.80%; Hs578T: 57.14%	—	—	—	Königsberg et al. [27]
Microfiltration (pore type)	Human breast cancer cells (MCF-7, MDA-MB-453, and SK-BR-3) and human prostate adenocarcinoma cancer cells (LNCAP, PC3)	7 μm pore filter: (i) 98 ± 2% (fixed MCF-7 cells); (ii) 85 ± 3% (unfixed MCF-7 cells); 8 μm pore filter: (i) 73 ± 13% (fixed MCF-7 cells); (ii) 50 ± 14% (unfixed MCF-7 cells)	—	—	~10 mL/min (concentration: 10^4 cells/mL)	Adams et al. [10]
	Human prostate cancer PC-3 cells	>90%	>90%	—	—	Lu et al. [28]
Microfiltration (3D membrane)	Human prostate adenocarcinoma cell line (LNCaP) and human breast adenocarcinoma cell line (MCF-7)	>86%	85%	—	~3.75 mL/min (concentration: 10^6 cells/mL)	Zheng et al. [11]
	Human gastric carcinoma cell line (NCI N-87)	>85%	—	—	2.5 mL/min (concentration: 2.5 × 10^5 cells/mL)	Yusa et al. [12]
	Breast cancer cell lines: MCF-7, MDA-MB-231	78%–83%	71%–74%	—	—; (1 μ/cancer cells spiked into 1 mL of undiluted blood)	Zhou et al. [13]
Microfiltration (weir-type)	Human A431 cancer cells	>95%	—	>98%	~5 mL/hr (10 tumors cells/mL of whole blood)	Chung et al. [15]
Microfiltration (pillar type)	MCF-7, SK-BR-3, J82, T24, RT4, and LNCaP	>90%	≥93%	>90%	—	Lin et al. [29]
Microfiltration (hetero-packed bead type)	Human breast cancer cells (MCF-7)	21%–40%	—		0.2 mL/hr (concentration: 10^6/mL)	Arya et al. [30]
Dielectrophoresis (planar configuration)	Human breast cancer cells (MCF-7)	(i) MCF-7: 75.18%; (ii) RBC: 99.24%; (iii) WBC: 94.23%	—	(i) MCF-7: 16.24%; (ii) RBC: —; (iii) WBC: —	~250 μL/s	Moon et al. [31]
Dielectrophoresis (contactless mode)	Human cervical carcinoma cell (HeLa cells)	64.5%	—	—	—; (concentration in diluted solution: 2.5 × 10^5 HeLa cells/mL, 3.25 × 10^6 RBC cells/mL, 3.25 × 10^3 WBC cells/mL)	Huang et al. [19]
Acoustophoresis	Prostate cancer cell line:
	DU145, PC3, and LNCAP	PFA-fixed cell sample; (i) DU145 and PC3: 85.4% at  J/m^3, 96.6% at  J/m^3; (ii) LNCaP: 55.5% at  J/m^3, 78.8% at  J/m^3; Non-PFA-fixed cell sample; (i) DU145: 36.1% at  J/m^3, 83.7% at  J/m^3	No significant changes were observed for acoustophoresis treated and untreated samples	PFA-fixed cell sample; (i) DU145 and PC3: 99.3% at  J/m^3, 97.9% at  J/m^3; Non-PFA-fixed cell sample; (i) DU145: 99.5% at  J/m^3, 93% at  J/m^3	~450 μL/min (2.5 × 10^5 tumor cells/mL spiked with 10-fold diluted whole blood)	Augustsson et al. [32]
	DU145, PC3, LNCAP, and VCaP	—	The average cell dead is <1% for DU145 and PC3, while ≤3% for LNCAP and VCaP	—	~100 μL/min	Burguillos et al. [33]
Hydrodynamic sorting (pinched flow fractionation)	MV3-melanoma cells	100%	~100%	(i) 0.4% hematocrit: 66.6%; (ii) 4% hematocrit: 15.4%; (iii) 9% hematocrit: 5.5%	600 μL/h (concentration in diluted solution: 8 × 10^5 tumor cells/mL, 6 × 10^8 RBC cells/mL)	Geislinger and Franke [34]
Hydrodynamic sorting (deterministic lateral displacement)	Human breast cancer cell line: MDAMB231, MCF10A, and PC3	≥85%	≥95%	—	10 mL/min (concentration: 10^7 cancer cells in 1 mL of blood diluted with buffer)	Loutherback et al. [22]
Hydrodynamic sorting (inertial lift force)	MCF-7	>85%	>98%	50%	3 mL/hr (concentration: 10–100 CTCs/mL of diluted whole blood samples)	Hou et al. [23]
Hydrodynamic sorting (inertia force)	MCF-7, T24, and MDA-MB-231	>80%	>80%	~4 log depletion of WBCs	2.0 mL/min (500 tumour cells per 7.5 mL of whole blood)	Warkiani et al. [35]
Hydrodynamic sorting (inertia force)	MCF-7 cancer cells	99.5%	—	—	3 to 12 mL/h (processing 4.2 × 10^7 cells/min to 2 × 10^7 cells/min)	Lee et al. [24]