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Updated: Jun 6, 2026

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A Uniform Shear Assay for Human Platelet and Cell Surface Receptors via Cone-plate Viscometry
Published on: June 5, 2019
Hydrophoretic high-throughput selection of platelets in physiological shear-stress range
Sungyoung Choi1, Taeyun Ku, Seungjeong Song
1Department of Bio and Brain Engineering, College of Life Science and Bioengineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, 335 Gwahangno, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 305-701, Republic of Korea.
Lab on a Chip
|November 13, 2010
Summary
This study introduces a new hydrophoretic device for gentle, high-throughput platelet purification. The parallelized, wide-channel system achieves rapid cell sorting without causing platelet stimulation or device clogging.
Area of Science:
- Biomedical Engineering
- Cell Separation Technology
- Microfluidics
Background:
- Current platelet purification methods often involve harsh conditions like high shear stress, leading to platelet activation and reduced utility.
- Existing techniques may require specialized buffers or external physical fields, limiting their clinical and biotechnological applicability.
- There is a need for gentle, fast, and high-throughput methods for isolating platelets and other rare blood cells.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and evaluate a novel hydrophoretic size separation technique for low-stress, high-throughput platelet purification.
- To enhance the throughput of hydrophoretic separation by parallelizing a wide-channel device.
- To demonstrate the ability of the system to handle clogging-prone materials like blood clots and plaques.
Main Methods:
- Utilized hydrophoretic size separation in a wide-channel microfluidic device.
- Parallelized 10 stacks of the wide-channel hydrophoresis device to increase throughput.
- Maintained physiological shear-stress ranges throughout the separation process.
- Assessed device performance based on throughput, purity, and clog-free operation.
Main Results:
- Achieved a high throughput of 2.9 million cells per second.
- Obtained a platelet purity of 76.8% using the parallelized device.
- Demonstrated clogging-free separation, effectively sorting blood clots and plaques.
- Maintained gentle separation conditions within the physiological shear-stress range.
Conclusions:
- Wide-channel hydrophoresis offers a gentle, fast, and clog-free method for cell sorting.
- Parallelization significantly enhances the throughput capabilities of hydrophoretic separation.
- This technology holds potential for the efficient purification of rare blood cells for clinical and biotechnological applications.

