Antibody-Conjugated Magnetic Beads For Sperm Sexing By A Multi-Wall Carbon Nanotube Microfluidic Device

Abstract

Bull production industries demand specific sexual bulls in response to different business productivity requirements. Therefore, sexual separation of sperm is essential for the livestock industry, increasing the demand for assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs). A popular sexual separation method in ART is monoclonal antibody enhancement, which does not affect the quality of the sperm and has specificity with high sexual separation accuracy. Moreover, microfluidic technique is an innovative tool for sperm separation, with increased installation efficiency and convenience but low accuracy and speed of detection. In this study, particles were separated using magnetic beads, magnetic beads on monoclonal antibodies, and sperm with the function of magnetic beads on monoclonal antibodies by controlling the microfluidic system fluid flow rate at 2 µL/min and releasing a 2.5-V electric field. This microfluidic device separated 100% and 95.42% of the magnetic beads and magnetic beads on monoclonal antibodies, respectively. The sperm separation test results showed that positively charged sperm Y moved to the negative electrical fluid channel with a specially designed multi-walled carbon nanotube microfluidic device that showed an X- and Y-sperm separation with a success rate of 80.12%. Compared with natural pregnancy (X- and Y-sperm ration 50:50, 50%), our proposed method is approximately 30.12% better.