Microfluidic platform capable of performing automatic tissue slide-based selex and phage display for rapid screening of affinity reagents specific to ovarian cancer

This paper reports a new integrated microfluidic platform capable of automating two kinds of on-chip tissue slide-based in-vitro screening processes, including a systematic evolution of ligands by exponential enrichment (SELEX) process and a phage display screening process. Tissue slide is one of the most important biopsy samples for cancer patients in clinical diagnosis. It is the first time that a solid biopsy (tissue slide) was used on an integrated microfluidic system for screening of two kinds of affinity reagents, including aptamers (nucleic acids type) and peptides (amino acids type). The screened aptamers and peptides have been tested with high affinity and specificity toward target cancer.