Detection of low-abundance membrane markers by immunofluorescence—a comparison of alternative high-sensitivity methods and reagents

Past, Present, and Future of Affinity-based Cell Separation Technologies

Progress in cell purification technology is critical to increase the availability of viable cells for therapeutic, diagnostic, and research applications. A variety of techniques are now available for cell separation, ranging from non-affinity methods such as density gradient centrifugation, dielectrophoresis, and filtration, to affinity methods such as chromatography, two-phase partitioning, and magnetic-/fluorescence-assisted cell sorting. For clinical and analytical procedures that require highly purified cells, the choice of cell purification method is crucial, since every method offers a different balance between yield, purity, and bioactivity of the cell product. For most applications, the requisite purity is only achievable through affinity methods, owing to the high target specificity that they grant. In this review, we discuss past and current methods for developing cell-targeting affinity ligands and their application in cell purification, along with the benefits and challenges associated with different purification formats. We further present new technologies, like stimuli-responsive ligands and parallelized microfluidic devices, towards improving the viability and throughput of cell products for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. Our comparative analysis provides guidance in the multifarious landscape of cell separation techniques and highlights new technologies that are poised to play a key role in the future of cell purification in clinical settings and the biotech industry. STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE: Technologies for cell purification have served science, medicine, and industrial biotechnology and biomanufacturing for decades. This review presents a comprehensive survey of this field by highlighting the scope and relevance of all known methods for cell isolation, old and new alike. The first section covers the main classes of target cells and compares traditional non-affinity and affinity-based purification techniques, focusing on established ligands and chromatographic formats. The second section presents an excursus of affinity-based pseudo-chromatographic and non-chromatographic technologies, especially focusing on magnetic-activated cell sorting (MACS) and fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS). Finally, the third section presents an overview of new technologies and emerging trends, highlighting how the progress in chemical, material, and microfluidic sciences has opened new exciting avenues towards high-throughput and high-purity cell isolation processes. This review is designed to guide scientists and engineers in their choice of suitable cell purification techniques for research or bioprocessing needs.

Ultrasensitive detection of DNA and protein markers in cancer cells

Cancer cells differ from normal cells in various parameters, and these differences are caused by genomic mutations and consequential altered gene expression. The genetic and functional heterogeneity of tumor cells is a major challenge in cancer research, detection, and effective treatment. As such, the use of diagnostic methods is important to reveal this heterogeneity at the single-cell level. Droplet microfluidic devices are effective tools that provide exceptional sensitivity for analyzing single cells and molecules. In this review, we highlight two novel methods that employ droplet microfluidics for ultra-sensitive detection of nucleic acids and protein markers in cancer cells. We also discuss the future practical applications of these methods.

Ultrasensitive detection of low-abundance surface-marker protein using isothermal rolling circle amplification in a microfluidic nanoliter platform

With advances in immunology and cancer biology, there is an unmet need for increasingly sensitive systems to monitor the expression of specific cell markers for the development of new diagnostic and therapeutic tools. To address this challenge, a highly sensitive labeling method that translates antigen-antibody recognition processes into DNA detection events that can be greatly amplified via isothermal rolling circle amplification (RCA) is applied. By merging the single-molecule detection power of RCA reactions with microfluidic technology, it is demonstrated that the identification of specific protein markers can be achieved on tumor-cell surfaces in miniaturized nanoliter reaction droplets. Furthermore, this combined approach of signal amplification in a microfluidic format could extend the utility of existing methods by reducing sample and reagent consumption and enhancing the sensitivities and specificities for various applications, including early diagnosis of cancer.

High-sensitivity immunofluorescence/flow cytometry: detection of cytokine receptors and other low-abundance membrane molecules

Cell marker identification by traditional phenotyping techniques is now considered straight-forward and relatively uncomplicated. In immunofluorescence/flow cytometry, the sensitivity, or detection limit, depends on the reagents, staining, and instrument parameters. The sensitivity of the most commonly used procedures, based on fluorescein-conjugated antibodies, approximately 2000 molecules of target antigen per cell, which is adequate for most of the widely used leukocyte markers. However, measuring target antigens of low density has proven very difficult indeed. Flow cytometric immunofluorescence is capable of detecting 100 molecules of target antigen per cell in practical applications, provided that every step of the staining and analysis procedure is optimized for sensitivity. This level of sensitivity reveals staining not seen using conventional analytical procedures. This unit discusses the underlying principles of high-sensitivity immunofluorescence and provides an excellent series of protocols for the practical detection of as few as 100 target antigen molecules per cell.

Studies on the potential use of CD38 expression as a marker for the efficacy of anti-retroviral therapy in HIV-1-infected patients in Thailand

The monitoring of the efficacy of anti-retroviral therapy (ART) is becoming an important issue in the developing world. The current use of CD4 counts, plasma viral loads, and monitoring of drug-resistant viruses are at present either uninformative or costly. Thus, more new cost-effective and practical techniques need to be established and implemented. Towards this goal, our lab has carried out studies on the potential use of CD38 frequency and density expression by flow analysis as a means to assess the efficacy of ART. Results of our studies using whole blood sample from normal healthy donors indicate that CD38 is expressed by a high frequency of not only CD4+ and CD8+ T cells but also most hematopoietic cell lineages analyzed. Detailed studies of CD38 expression along with other cell surface markers using whole blood sample from HIV-1-infected patients showed that the most discriminating change was the increased frequency and density of CD38 expression by CD3+CD8+ T cells. Of importance was our preliminary finding that a reversal of the increased frequency and density of CD38 expression by CD8+ T cells only appeared in the whole blood sample from patients who were responders to ART but not those who were drug failures. These initial data provide a platform and incentive for larger cohort studies including prospective pre- and post-ART for the institution of such monitoring techniques in resource limited settings.