Work

Dissolution-guided wetting for microarray and microfluidic devices

Year: 2012

Type: article

Abstract: The trapping of air bubbles presents a substantial impediment for the user in the increasingly widespread use of lab-on-a-chip products having microcavities in the forms of microwells, traps, dead ends and corners. Here we demonstrate a simple, effective, and passive method to eliminate air bubbles by coating hydrophilized microarray and microfluidic devices with a monosaccharide such as D-glucose or D-sorbitol, where the microcavities are filled with a conformal, elliptical, cone-shaped monosaccharide solid. These devices were stored in air for up to 6 months with a complete rewetting of the microcavities by dissolution of the monosaccharide with an aqueous solution.

Source: Lab on a Chip

DOI: 10.1039/c2lc40330g

Authors: Yuli Wang, Christopher E. Sims, Nancy L. Allbritton

Institutions: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina State University

Language: English

Topic: Microfluidic and Capillary Electrophoresis Applications

Subfield: Biomedical Engineering

Field: Engineering

Domain: Physical Sciences

Open Access status: green

Funders: National Institutes of Health, National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering

Awards: Rapid Genetic Engineering of Stem Cells, Arrays for Cloning Growth Suppressed Cells