Journal ArticleDOI
Creating, transporting, cutting, and merging liquid droplets by electrowetting-based actuation for digital microfluidic circuits
TLDR
In this paper, the authors report the completion of four fundamental fluidic operations considered essential to build digital microfluidic circuits, which can be used for lab-on-a-chip or micro total analysis system (/spl mu/TAS): 1) creating, 2) transporting, 3) cutting, and 4) merging liquid droplets, all by electrowetting.Abstract:
Reports the completion of four fundamental fluidic operations considered essential to build digital microfluidic circuits, which can be used for lab-on-a-chip or micro total analysis system (/spl mu/TAS): 1) creating, 2) transporting, 3) cutting, and 4) merging liquid droplets, all by electrowetting, i.e., controlling the wetting property of the surface through electric potential. The surface used in this report is, more specifically, an electrode covered with dielectrics, hence, called electrowetting-on-dielectric (EWOD). All the fluidic movement is confined between two plates, which we call parallel-plate channel, rather than through closed channels or on open surfaces. While transporting and merging droplets are easily verified, we discover that there exists a design criterion for a given set of materials beyond which the droplet simply cannot be cut by EWOD mechanism. The condition for successful cutting is theoretically analyzed by examining the channel gap, the droplet size and the degree of contact angle change by electrowetting on dielectric (EWOD). A series of experiments is run and verifies the criterion.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
How to make sticky surfaces slippery: Contact angle hysteresis in electrowetting with alternating voltage
Fahong Li,Frieder Mugele +1 more
TL;DR: In this paper, it was shown that the contact angle hysteresis for sessile drops in electrowetting almost disappears with increasing alternating voltage, whereas for direct voltage it remains constant.
Journal ArticleDOI
Flow rate analysis of a surface tension driven passive micropump
Erwin Berthier,David J. Beebe +1 more
TL;DR: A microfluidic passive pumping method relying on surface tension properties is investigated and a physical model developed and it is found that during the first phase the flow rate is stable and that this phase can be prolonged by refilling the inlet drop to produce continuous flow in the microchannel.
Journal ArticleDOI
A fast and efficient microfluidic system for highly selective one-to-one droplet fusion
TL;DR: This work describes and characterize a simple and extremely reliable technique for the one-to-one fusion of droplet pairs in a microfluidic system at kHz frequencies and makes use of transient states in the stabilization of the droplet interface by surfactant, coupled to a proper geometrical design of a coalescence module to induce selective fusion.
Journal ArticleDOI
Cross-scale electric manipulations of cells and droplets by frequency-modulated dielectrophoresis and electrowetting
TL;DR: Two important electric forces, dielectrophoresis (DEP) and electrowetting-on-dielectric (EWOD) are demonstrated by dielectric-coated electrodes on a single chip to manipulate objects on different scales, which results in a dielectophoretic concentrator in an EWOD-actuated droplet.
Journal ArticleDOI
Digital Microfluidic Magnetic Separation for Particle-Based Immunoassays
TL;DR: The first particle-based immunoassay on DMF without the aid of oil carrier fluid to enable droplet movement is reported, allowing the realization of a novel on-chip particle separation and resuspension method capable of removing greater than 90% of unbound reagents in one step.
References
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Book
Fundamentals of microfabrication
TL;DR: The second edition of the Fundamentals of Microfabrication as discussed by the authors provides an in-depth coverage of the science of miniaturization, its methods, and materials, from the fundamentals of lithography through bonding and packaging to quantum structures and molecular engineering.
Journal ArticleDOI
Electrowetting-based actuation of liquid droplets for microfluidic applications
TL;DR: In this article, a microactuator for rapid manipulation of discrete microdroplets is presented, which is accomplished by direct electrical control of the surface tension through two sets of opposing planar electrodes fabricated on glass.
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Micromachined Transducers Sourcebook
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present an overview of Micromachining Techniques, Mechanical Transducers, Optical Transducers and Ionizing Radiation Transducers for Microfluidic Devices.
Journal ArticleDOI
Electrowetting-based actuation of droplets for integrated microfluidics
TL;DR: In this paper, an alternative approach to microfluidics based upon the micromanipulation of discrete droplets of aqueous electrolyte by electrowetting is reported.