Abstract
Exosomes, molecular cargos secreted by almost all mammalian cells, are considered as promising biomarkers to identify many diseases including cancers. However, the small size of exosomes (30-200 nm) poses serious challenges in their isolation from complex media containing a variety of extracellular vesicles (EVs) of different sizes, especially in small sample volumes. Here we present a viscoelasticity-based microfluidic system to directly separate exosomes from cell culture media or serum in a continuous, size-dependent, and label-free manner. Using a small amount of biocompatible polymer as the additive in the media to control the viscoelastic forces exerted on EVs, we are able to achieve a high separation purity (>90%) and recovery (>80%) of exosomes. The proposed technique may serve as a versatile platform to facilitate exosome analyses in diverse biochemical applications.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 6968-6976 |
Number of pages | 9 |
Journal | ACS Nano |
Volume | 11 |
Issue number | 7 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jul 25 2017 |
Keywords
- exosomes
- microfluidics
- microvesicles
- separation
- viscoelasticity
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Materials Science(all)
- Engineering(all)
- Physics and Astronomy(all)