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Design and application of a self-pumping microfluidic staggered herringbone mixer

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Abstract

The rapid mixing of reagents is critical to a wide range of chemical and biological reactions but is difficult to implement in microfluidic devices, particularly in capillary action/passive pumping devices or in point-of-need environments. Here, we develop a self-pumping asymmetric staggered herringbone mixer made from only laser-ablated glass and tape. This lab-on-a-chip platform is capable of rapid flow (0.14 mL min−1, 1 cm s−1) and fast mixing (< 10 s) without external forces or pumps and is amenable to the flow of non-aqueous solvents. Furthermore, the degree of mixing and flow rates are easily tunable through the length and depth of the herringbone grooves, and the thickness of the double-sided tape that defines the channel height, respectively. The device utility is demonstrated for chemical and biological assays through the reaction of Ni(II) and DMG in ethanol/water and the enzymatic reaction of o-dianisidine with peroxidase, respectively.

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Acknowledgements

A.K.K. acknowledges financial support under award 1751628 from the National Science Foundation and under awards R01HL135505 and R21HL139208 from the National Institutes of Health. C.S.H. acknowledges support under R33ES024719. Additional support was provided by Colorado State University.

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Author notes

  1. Robert B. Channon, Ruth F. Menger and Wei Wang contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Bioengineering, Imperial College London, London, W12 0BZ, UK

    Robert B. Channon & Charles S. Henry

  2. Department of Chemistry, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, 80523, USA

    Ruth F. Menger

  3. Department of Mechanical, Aerospace and Biomedical Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, 37996, USA

    Wei Wang

  4. Departamento de Química, Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras de Ribeirão Preto, Universidade de São Paulo, Ribeirão Preto, SP, 14090-901, Brazil

    Daniel B. Carrão

  5. Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695, USA

    Sravanthi Vallabhuneni & Arun K. Kota

  6. Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, 80523, USA

    Charles S. Henry

  7. School of Biomedical Engineering, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, 80523, USA

    Charles S. Henry

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  1. Robert B. Channon
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Channon, R.B., Menger, R.F., Wang, W. et al. Design and application of a self-pumping microfluidic staggered herringbone mixer. Microfluid Nanofluid 25, 31 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10404-021-02426-x

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