藉由研究循環腫瘤細胞(circulating tumor cells, CTCs)可以幫助我們了解癌細胞轉移的生物學，透過監測患者血液中CTCs的數量更可以幫助我們了解治療的方式是否有效。大多數癌症病患的死因是由轉移的癌細胞導致，而非原發腫瘤，因此若能於癌症初期就從血液中偵測到CTC，將提供早期的診斷或甚至於個人化的治療。 本實驗利用一種低成本的濕式蝕刻法製備出矽多層次奈米結構 (Pyramid/Nanowire, NW)來捕捉血液中的鼻咽癌(nasopharyngeal cancer, NPC)細胞。根據實驗結果顯示，金字塔結構可以透過它的幾何形狀來增加表面積，使基板表面上抗體的數量增加，因能夠提升細胞與基板產生鍵結的機會。 此外，奈米線結構可以增加細胞與基板之間的附著性，因為癌細胞表面的偽足可以延伸至奈米線與奈米線之間的縫隙中，使Pyramid NW結構成為一個理想的CTC捕捉基板。 大多數鼻咽癌病患血液中EBV DNA的濃度會高於一般人。近年來由於表面增強拉曼散射(SERS)具高靈敏度來偵測分子的特異性，這項技術已可用來偵測DNA。本實驗中僅需簡單的將Pyramid NW基板泡入硝酸銀溶液中，即可變成一個良好的SERS基板，其DNA偵測的極限可達到10-13M，增強因子經由計算後也高達107。 ;Studying circulating tumor cells (CTCs) helps us understand the biology of metastasis. Monitoring CTCs counts in patients’ blood can also help us know if the treatment works or not. Most cancer patients were died because of distant metastases instead of primary tumor. Thus, early detection of CTCs could provide early diagnosis of metastases and even personalized therapy. Herein, we introduced a new CTC capturing substrate composed of Si hierarchical nanostructures (Pyramid NW) method to capture nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) cell in vitro. According to the results, the pyramid microstructure increased the surface area because of its geometric shape. The amount of antibodies on the substrate also increase, enhancing the cell-binding ability of the substrate. The nanowire (NW) structure improved the cell adhesion by letting the cytoskeleton of the cells extend into the gaps between the NW, making pyramid NW structure an ideal substrate for CTC capture. The Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) DNA titers in NPC patient’ blood is usually higher than normal people. In recent years, Surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) has become an efficient technique for detecting DNA because of its single molecule level sensitivity and molecular specificity. In this study, our pyramid NW substrate can easily be transformed into a SERS substrate by dipping it into AgNO3 solution. The DNA detection limit can reach up to 10-13M and the calculated enhancement factor can achieve up to 107.
