WANA (August 04) – Fatemeh Molaabbasi, a faculty member at the Cancer Research Center of Jihad University in Iran, announced the development of the world’s first full-blood dialysis device for cancer patients, aimed at both diagnostic and therapeutic purposes.

 

Fatemeh Molaabbasi, the project lead, stated that current methods for isolating circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are inefficient due to the low number of CTCs in blood samples and the time-consuming processes involved. The goal was to design a CTC dialysis system capable of efficiently processing the complete blood of cancer patients.

 

Two strategies were key to this development: the synthesis of new core-shell Cu ferrites for tracking CTCs with anti-HER2 antibodies and the creation of a microfluidic platform with a 3D printed scaffold that captures CTCs using magnetic nanoparticles.

 

The system demonstrated over 80% efficiency in isolating CTCs, with the cells remaining viable and capable of proliferation, and no adverse effects on normal blood cells. The device can process large volumes of blood within a reasonable time, making it suitable for both diagnostic and therapeutic purposes.

 

This innovation has led to the registration of a patent and the publication of a paper in a high-impact journal (impact factor 7.4, Q1).