Related Experiment Video
Updated: Dec 25, 2025
Microfluidics-based High-throughput Circulating Tumor Cell Sorting and Single-cell Sequencing Technology
Published on: November 14, 2025
Spectrally Combined Encoding for Profiling Heterogeneous Circulating Tumor Cells Using a Multifunctional
Ling-Ling Wu1, Zhi-Ling Zhang1, Man Tang1
1College of Chemistry and Molecular Sciences, The Institute for Advanced Studies, Wuhan University, Wuhan, 430072, P. R. China.
Abstract:
Comprehensive phenotypic profiling of heterogeneous circulating tumor cells (CTCs) at single-cell resolution has great importance for cancer management. Herein, a novel spectrally combined encoding (SCE) strategy was proposed for multiplex biomarker profiling of single CTCs using a multifunctional nanosphere-mediated microfluidic platform. Different cellular biomarkers uniquely labeled by multifunctional nanosphere barcodes, possessing identical magnetic tags and distinct optical signatures, enabled isolation of heterogeneous CTCs with over 91.6 % efficiency and in situ SCE of phenotypes. By further trapping individual CTCs in ordered microstructures on chip, composite single-cell spectral signatures were conveniently and efficiently obtained, allowing reliable spectral-readout for multiplex biomarker profiling. This SCE strategy exhibited great potential in multiplex profiling of heterogeneous CTC phenotypes, offering new avenues for cancer study and precise medicine.
