The Parsortix™ Cell Separation System-A versatile liquid biopsy platform

Abstract

Cancer cells from solid tumors can enter the circulatory system and survive to subsequently form distant metastases. The CellSearch® system (Menarini-Silicon Biosystems, Huntingdon Valley, PA) was the first, FDA-cleared system that provided a reliable tool for the investigation of circulating tumor cells (CTCs), which have been shown to be strongly associated with poor survival and therapy failure. Since that time, a number of new technologies have been introduced to improve CTC detection and/or isolation for further characterization. The continued and growing interest in the "liquid biopsy" field has spurred the development of numerous different CTC technologies. However, selecting the most appropriate CTC platform for individual applications can be challenging. No consensus has yet been reached in the community regarding which liquid biopsy technology is optimal. Here, we introduce the Parsortix™ Cell Separation System (ANGLE North America, Inc., King of Prussia, PA), a microfluidic based technology that captures rare cells based on size and deformability, offers reproducibly high capture efficiency, and produces highly enriched, viable (viability dependent on preservative used) CTCs that are amenable to a multitude of downstream analyses, including the isolation and interrogation of single cells. © 2018 The Authors. Cytometry Part A published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of International Society for Advancement of Cytometry.

Keywords: circulating tumor cell; liquid biopsy; microfluidics; rare cell isolation.

Conflict of interest statement

M. Craig Miller, Peggy S. Robinson, Christopher Wagner, and Daniel J. O'Shannessy are paid employees of ANGLE North America, Inc. M. Craig Miller, Peggy S. Robinson, and Christopher Wagner are stock holders in ANGLE plc. Peggy S. Robinson is a corporate officer of ANGLE North America, Inc.

© 2018 The Authors. Cytometry Part A published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of International Society for Advancement of Cytometry.

Figures

Figure 1

Parsortix™ PR1 Cell Separation System.

Figure 2

(A) Image and diagram of a Parsortix GEN3 Cell Separation Cassette showing how the blood flows into the cassette, over the step structures and through the critical gap. (B) Example images of nucleated blood cells and CTCs harvested from prostate cancer patients (7.5 ml EDTA blood samples processed within 4 h after collection) and immunofluorescently stained with DAPI (blue), CD45 (red), cytokeratin (green), and vimentin (yellow). (C) Example image of CTCs harvested from breast cancer patient (4 ml CellSave blood sample processed

Figure 3

5‐Day linearity study on Parsortix System using live, fluorescently labeled SKBR3 cells spiked into 5 ml EDTA blood drawn from healthy volunteers. (A) Plot of the actual number of SKBR3 cells spiked vs. the number of SKBR3 cells captured in the separation cassette. (B) Plot of the number of SKBR3 cells captured in the separation cassette vs. the number of SKBR3 cells harvested out of the separation cassette. (C) Plot of the actual number of SKBR3 cells spiked vs. the number of SKBR3 cells harvested out of the separation cassette.