Figure 4.

CTCTrap schematic. (A) Blood from a patient is circulated through a (B) functionalized 3D matrix (with 1 or more antibodies targeting CTC specific markers) that can withstand up to 5 L of blood flow and porous enough to prevent clogging while still able to retain cells; (C) Eluate of retained cells will be (D) filtered through 1–5 µm pores to reduce (E) hematopoietic background and retain the cells of interest; (F) Alternatively, retained cells can also be transferred to a culture dish containing appropriate growth conditions that allow selective expansion of CTC. Expanded cells can be further used to test anti-tumor drugs; (G) Retained cells will be further immunostained to discriminate CTC from non-CTC objects and enumerate them for patient prognosis.