Optics and Precision Engineering, Volume. 28, Issue 12, 2636(2020)
D esign of high th roughput d roplet gen eration ch ip
High throughput monodisperse nano-liter/pico-liter droplet emulsions are essential in several biomedical applications, such as droplet digital PCR, mass spectrometry, and cell sorting. However, the preparation rate of existing technologies can only reach 1 000/s, which restricts development of the bio. medical field. We present a novel technology for providing monodisperse droplets with high throughput us. ing centrifugal force and a micro-nozzle array. First, we designed the centrifugal droplet microfluidic chip and studied the relationships of droplet diameters with dimensions of the micro-nozzle, centrifugal accelera. tion, and flow rate based on simulation of the droplets’generation using the micro-nozzle;based on these, we obtained optimized design parameters for generating 1-nL droplets. Then, a microfluidic chip was fabri. cated using standard lithography. Finally, high throughput droplet generation was performed. The experi. mental and simulation results indicate that the droplet size is inversely related to the centrifugal acceleration and directly proportional to the micro-nozzle size. The droplet size is stable in a large range of flow rate, which indicates excellent robustness. Homogenous droplets with pre-selectable diameters in a range from 105 to 145 μm were generated with a coefficient of variation of 3% and generation rate of 27 000/s under a cen. trifugalaccelerationrangeof250g to500g, demonstratingultra-high throughputcharacteristicsofthechip.
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ZHOU Wu-ping, TANG Yu-guo, LI Hai-wen, JIANG Ke-ming, LI Cong, ZHANG Tao, ZHANG Zhi-qiang. D esign of high th roughput d roplet gen eration ch ip[J]. Optics and Precision Engineering, 2020, 28(12): 2636
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Received: Apr. 26, 2020
Accepted: --
Published Online: Jan. 19, 2021
The Author Email: Hai-wen LI (lihw@sibet.ac.cn)