Graduate Research and Discovery Symposium (GRADS)

Authors

Saurin H. Patel

Advisor

Dr. Xiangchun Xuan

Document Type

Poster

Department

Mechanical Engineering

Publication Date

Spring 2013

Abstract

Dielectrophoresis (DEP) is the translation of a particle either along (i.e., positive dielectrophoresis) or against (i.e., negative dielectrophoresis) an electric field gradient if the particle is more or less polarizable than the suspending medium. The polarizability of a particle is dependent on its electrical and mechanical properties. This makes DEP a versatile tool for particle and cell handling, especially in microdevices due to its favorable scaling. Traditional DEP is realized through patterning pair(s) of microelectrodes onto the surface of a micro channel. Recently DEP has also been implemented by the use of channel geometry, which can be the variation in channel cross-section or the curvature of the channel itself. Both methods, however, rely on in-channel electrical or mechanical parts to create electric field gradients, which complicate device fabrication and causes fouling trouble due to electrochemical reactions and electrothermal flow effects etc. Reservoir-based dielectrophoresis (rDEP) is a newly developed microfluidic method that exploits negative dielectrophoresis induced at the reservoir-microchannel junction to manipulate particles inside a reservoir. As the rDEP focusing, concentration and separation of particles all take place inside a reservoir; the entire microchannel can be spared for pre- and post-analysis. This makes the rDEP method perfectly positioned for lab-on-a-chip applications.

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