Researchers create new technology to enhance cancer detection, treatment

Researchers at the University of Technology Sydney have created a novel tool that enables doctors to skip invasive biopsy operations and track treatment effectiveness by detecting and analysing cancer cells from blood samples. Professor Majid Warkiani from the UTS School of Biomedical Engineering said getting a biopsy can cause discomfort to patients, as well as an increased risk of complications due to surgery and higher costs, but an accurate cancer diagnoHe said, “Managing cancer through the assessment of tumour cells in blood samples is far less invasive than taking tissue biopsies. It allows doctors to do repeat tests and monitor a patient's response to treatment.” The Static Droplet Microfluidic devise is able to rapidly detect circulating tumour cells that have broken away from a primary tumour and entered the bloodstream.
The device uses a unique metabolic signature of cancer to differentiate tumour cells from normal blood cells. The study has been published in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Biosensors and Bioelectronics. "In the 1920s, Otto Warburg discovered that cancer cells consume a lot of glucose and so produce more lactate. Our device monitors single cells for increased lactate using pH-sensitive fluorescent dyes that detect acidification around cells," said Professor Warkiani.
"A single tumour cell can exist among billions of blood cells in just one millilitre of blood, making it very difficult to find. The new detection technology has 38,400 chambers capable of isolating and classifying the number of metabolically active tumour cells," he said. Once the tumour cells are identified with the device, they can undergo genetic and molecular analysis, which can aid in the diagnosis and classification of cancer and inform personalised treatment plans.