Nature sub-journal: Controlling cells for personalized cancer treatment

These capabilities can serve a variety of fields such as materials science, soft condensed matter physics, biophysics, life sciences, and medicine

For example, researchers have shown that the device can selectively pair two separate cells and measure their adhesion—a feat that doctors can use to determine treatments for individual cancer patients

The findings were published online March 24 in the journal Nature Materials

"The separation of pairs of particles or cells has been a major goal in the field of acoustic manipulation for many years," said Tony Jun Huang, the William Bevin Distinguished Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science at Duke University

Acoustic tweezers are a rapidly developing field that uses various physical phenomena of sound waves to gently manipulate particles or cells suspended in liquids without touching them

Now, the researchers have added a new layer of sophistication to these devices by introducing piezoelectric melodies and harmonies into the device

The new device works by placing a sound-producing transducer on each side of a small, square cavity filled with liquid

"I modeled how these waves combine to manipulate particles in the chamber, and then ran experiments to see actual results," said Shujie Yang, a postdoctoral associate in Huang's lab

In this paper, Yang demonstrates several new capabilities of the harmonic duo acoustic tweezers

Speaking of single particle processing, the paper shows that particles are induced into three different structures that are strikingly similar to the letter O, and the device then pairs dozens of single particles, like teenagers at a school dance the same

In a final demonstration, Yang showed the device could select a pair of cells from a group, push them together, and then separate them again

According to the researchers, this is the most exciting feature of the HANDS platform, as it enables detailed testing of personalized medicine

"I'm excited about the capabilities of this platform, which is as gentle as a mother's hand," said study co-leader Luke Lee, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School

"For example, we can systematically study the interaction of T cells with cancer cells in a high-throughput manner and obtain precise cell-cell interaction forces," Lee said

Journal Reference :

1. Shujie Yang, Zhenhua Tian, ​​Zeyu Wang, Joseph Rufo, Peng Li, John Mai, Jianping Xia, Hunter Bachman, Po-Hsun Huang, Mengxi Wu, Chuyi Chen, Luke P.