ABSTRACT
Magnetic separation (MS) has been identified as one of the feasible and promising techniques for sample preparation in biomedical diagnosis. For effective implementation of MS, the targeted entity (biological cell such as bacteria, virus etc.) is magnetically labelled such that its motion can be manipulated by externally applied magnetic field and hence be isolated out from its suspending media. Depending on the magnitude of applied magnetic field gradient, MS technology can be crudely categorized into two classes, namely high-gradient MS (HGMS) and low-gradient MS (LGMS), which exhibit distinctive separation mechanism. Thus, it is the aim of this chapter to summarize the utilization of HGMS and LGMS techniques in the field of biomedical diagnosis. In addition, the effects of control parameters (particle size and concentration) on the performance of MS-aided biomedical diagnosis are thoroughly reviewed. Nonetheless, some major issues that should be taken into consideration throughout the design and optimization of MS-aided biomedical diagnosis are suggested and discussed in detail. It is the focus of this chapter to provide an overview of the working principles of MS that serves as the crucial information for successful implementation of MS in biomedical diagnosis.
