Xu W., Tian Y., Bisaria H., Ahn P., Li X., Tsai Y-T, Choi C-H, Yang E.H.
Stevens Institute of Technology, US
Keywords: droplet manipulation, polypyrrole, tunable wetting
Electrowetting on dielectric (EWOD) technique has been used to manipulate microliter-sized individual droplets for microfluidic application. However, EWOD-based techniques typically require relatively high actuation voltages (12-80V), which is undesirable for biomedical applications or the applications including on-site operation. Therefore, an alternative technique to realize a low-voltage droplet manipulation would be extremely beneficial. In this work, we demonstrate a new mechanism of the liquid droplet manipulation at low voltages (< 1.5 V) by utilizing the tunable wetting on dodecylbenzenesulfonate doped polypyrrole (PPy(DBS)) surface. In a slightly tilted (4°) microchannel, we further demonstrate a controlled lateral transport of an aqueous droplet via tunable wetting on PPy(DBS). The reported mechanism will pave a new way for the development of future low-voltage digital microfluidics platform.
Journal: TechConnect Briefs
Volume: 2, Nanotechnology 2013: Electronics, Devices, Fabrication, MEMS, Fluidics and Computational (Volume 2)
Published: May 12, 2013
Pages: 322 - 325
Industry sector: Sensors, MEMS, Electronics
Topic: Modeling & Simulation of Microsystems
ISBN: 978-1-4822-0584-8