Basic Principles in Lab-on-a-Chip (LOAC) Technologies for the Study of Circulating Biomarkers: Applications in Liquid Biopsies

02 Oct 2017, at 12:00-14:30 in Coronado Island, California

Basic Principles in Lab-on-a-Chip (LOAC) Technologies for the Study of Circulating Biomarkers: Applications in Liquid Biopsies

The goal of this short course is to introduce participants into the burgeoning area of liquid biopsies and the technologies used for the isolation of the markers (Circulating Tumor Cells, CTCs, cell-free DNA, cfDNA, and exosomes) directly from whole blood comprising the liquid biopsy. The major technology platform that will be discussed includes lab-on-a-chip (LOAC) platforms.

This Short Course will be Broken Down into Two General Areas

• Operational characteristics of LOAC platforms and their appropriateness for selecting rare markers from whole blood
• Application of LOAC technologies for the selection of rare circulating biomarkers from whole blood
  

The Topic Areas Addressed in this Short Course are Outlined Below

Basic Fundamentals of LOAC Platforms

• Brief introduction to the analytical challenges with the isolation of circulating markers from whole blood: CTCs, cfDNA and exosomes
• Introduction to LOAC technologies; what can they provide with respect to the analysis of rare circulating markers and comparison to benchtop procedures
• Materials for LOAC
• Fabrication technologies
• Micromilling
• Lithography
• Dry/wet etching
• Molding
• Metrology and fluid characteristics in microfluidics
• Electrokinetic versus hydrodynamic flow
• Basic fluid and particle (cell) transport
  

Application of LOC Technologies for the Isolation of Circulating Biomarkers from Whole Blood

• Basic components of the liquid biopsy
• CTCs
• What is a CTC including different types?
• Clinical information from CTCs
• Benchtop techniques for the isolation of CTCs
• cfDNA
• Characteristics of cfDNA
• How much circulating tumor DNA is found in whole blood?
• What clinical information can be garnered from cfDNA?
• QIAGEN-based techniques for isolating cfDNA
• Isolation from plasma is required
• Exosomes
• What is an exosome and how is it generated?
• Physical characteristics of exosomes
• Ultra-centrifugation methods for isolating exosomes
• Why is it necessary to isolate exosomes from plasma?
• LOAC platforms for isolating plasma from whole blood
• Skimming technologies
• Throughput – how much blood is necessary to search for rare markers?
• LOAC platforms for the analysis of CTCs
• Biological-based techniques
• Sinusoidal chip
• Micro-pillar based chip with herringbone mixer
• Nano-pillar chips for isolating CTCs
• iChip
• Physical-based techniques
• Microfluidics using dielectrophoresis
• Size-based separation using inertial lift forces or micro-pores
• LOAC platforms for the analysis of cfDNA
• Techniques that use magnetic beads
• Solid-phase extraction of cfDNA
• LOAC platforms for the analysis of exosomes
• Centrifugation-based techniques
• Affinity selection of disease-specific exosomes
• Micro-pillar technologies
• Solid-phase affinity selection
  

All course delegates receive the presentations from this course as well as reviews, publications and background material which are excellent resources for business plans, R&D and investor presentations.

This training course includes lunch for all course delegates.