Smart‑brush yield tech

The article "Electrostatic Cell Trapping for Enhanced Sample Yield in Brush Cytology" appears in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces (DOI 10.1021/acsami.5c24675) and is dated March 18, 2026, with authors Magdalena Bartolewska, Patrick Martin, Agniva Dutta, Rita Vilensky, Noa Ben‑Asher, Leeya Engel, Filippo Pierini, Iyad Khamaysi and Eyal Zussman (orcid.org)). The team chemically modified polyamide (PA) brush bristles with the polycation poly(ethylenimine) (PEI) and reported a two‑fold increase in HeLa cell attachment in vitro and an approximately 5‑fold rise in cellularity on ex vivo porcine stomach histology (scilit.com)). A mechanistic model in the paper quantifies forces on epithelial cells, showing hydrodynamic drag increases with brushing velocity and identifying spatial regions where electrostatic attraction between charged bristles and negatively charged cells can overcome that drag to trap cells (scilit.com)). Senior and corresponding investigators include Prof. Eyal Zussman of the Technion’s Mechanical Engineering faculty and Dr. Iyad Khamaysi of Rambam Health Care Campus, with experimental contributors affiliated with the Institute of Fundamental Technological Research (IPPT PAN) in Warsaw (cris.technion.ac.il)). The authors frame the work for mucosal sampling during gastrointestinal endoscopy, citing pancreas and bile‑duct brushing as target applications, against a background where ERCP brush cytology sensitivity in clinical series has been reported in the low‑to‑mid tens of percent while specificity can be ~98% in some cohorts (example sensitivity ~42% reported in a large series). (scilit.com)) The paper characterizes the PEI‑coating approach as simple, efficient and cost‑effective and explicitly positions the results as preclinical data that warrant translational/clinical validation to determine impact on diagnostic cytology and downstream molecular testing (DOI:10.1021/acsami.5c24675). (scilit.com))