Publications

Abstract not provided.

Microfluidic devices have been proposed for 'Lab-on-a-Chip' applications for nearly a decade. Despite the unquestionable promise of these devices to allow rapid, sensitive and portable biochemical analysis, few practical devices exist. It is often difficult to adapt current laboratory techniques to the microscale because bench-top methods use discrete liquid volumes, while most current microfluidic devices employ streams of liquid confined in a branching network of micron-scale channels. The goal of this research was to use two phase liquid flows, creating discrete packets of liquid. Once divided into discrete packets, the packets can be moved controllably within the microchannels without loss of material. Each packet is equivalent to a minute test tube, holding a fraction from a separation or an aliquot to be reacted. We report on the fabrication of glass and PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane) devices that create and store packets.