Figure 1

Microfluidic high-throughput (HT) cell migration chip for migration based selection. (a,b) Schematics of the chip. (a) We initially load cells into the left/right channels. (b) After cell loading, serum is introduced as a chemoattractant for cell migration into the central channel. Highly migratory cells move to the central channel from the left/right channels perfused with serum-free media. Finally, we selectively retrieve highly-migratory cells from the central channel and non-migratory cells from the right/left channels, respectively, by trypsinization. (c) Photo of a fabricated 900-channel device. Inlets are on the right side, outlets are on the left side, and the migration channels are in the center. The penny is used for scale. (d–f) SUM159 cell loading, migration, and retrieval on-chip. (d) Uniform initial cell loading at the entrance of migration channels. (e) 8-hour time-lapse tracking of cell migration from the left loading channel into migration channels. A highly-migratory cell has moved more than 300 µm, while non-migratory cells remain at the loading position. (f) Successful cell retrieval by flowing trypsin in the central channel for 5 minutes. (scale bar: 50 µm) (g) SEM of the chip with higher magnification of a cell entering a channel. (h,i) Graphs show positions of individual cells and box plot and whiskers summaries for migration of SUM159 (h) and MDA-MB-231 (i) cells toward both 5% and 10% fetal bovine serum solution added in the central channel. The elevated migration of chemotaxis validates the migration experiment setup. (n = 900 channels). ***refers to P < 0.001.