Inertial Microfluidics for Multiplexed Affinity Separation of Proteins and Cells

We present an inertial microfluidic platform for rapid, multiplexed affinity purification of proteins and cells from complex mixtures. Beads of different sizes, coated with different bait molecules bind specific proteins or cells in a single reaction step and the bound targets are then size-sorted by flowing in a spiral microchannel. We use this scheme to simultaneously purify antibodies specific to three different HIV antigens from HIV patient sera. We then demonstrate the simultaneous sorting of various cell types and also the isolation of rare antigen-specific cells such as HIV-specific cells from peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) from HIV patients.