Sirris and MEDVIA are working together on Medical Diagnostics Goes Micro and Smart, a Vlaio-funded research-to-industry tech transfer project. Sirris has produced a series of articles on microfluidics to help industry better understand what it can provide to them.

ARTICLE 3 of 7

Polymer-based microfluidic chip production is ideally suited for high-volume, low-cost applications such as bedside diagnostics, quality control in the field and rapid sample preparation for analysis. A range of different techniques are used that make it possible to produce microscopic patterns on macroscopic parts, which is a characteristic of microfluidics.

Some techniques are mostly used in research and development (R&D), while others are perfectly suited for industrial-scale production.

1)  Soft lithography

Soft lithography in combination with casting a thermochemically-curing polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) elastomer is a particularly well-proven technique in academic R&D. This allows the creation of flexible replicas that can be used either as parts or as moulds for reproducing microscale patterns in liquid materials as these are curing. This method adds great flexibility to the rapid prototyping of complex designs.

2)  Stacking and laminating pre-cut polymer films

Stacking and laminating pre-cut polymer films (by laser, milling or robotic cutting) is also a fast and simple prototyping technique that can be used in R&D to produce thin and/or flexible microfluidic systems.

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Article 1: Microfluidics – how an entire lab process fits on a bank card
https://www.sirris.be/en/inspiration/microfluidics-how-entire-lab-process-fits-bank-card

Article 2: Microfluidic chip design
https://www.sirris.be/en/inspiration/microfluidic-chip-design

Article 4: Computer vision used for detection of fluid front in microfluidic chip
https://www.sirris.be/en/inspiration/computer-vision-used-detection-fluid-front-microfluidic-chip-part-4

Article 5: Closing event of project Medical Diagnostics Goes Micro and Smart
https://www.sirris.be/en/inspiratie/slotevent-project-medical-diagnostics-goes-micro-and-smart

Article 6: Lab-on-a-chip detection techniques
https://www.sirris.be/en/inspiration/lab-chip-detection-techniques-part-6

Article 7: Temperature control in miniaturised devices for fast medical diagnostics
https://www.sirris.be/en/inspiration/temperature-control-miniaturised-devices-fast-medical-diagnostics-part-7