Paper-based disposable electrowetting chip for microfluidic application

In biology and chemical industries, there are lots of works to do in a laboratory with micron and nano-sized of samples, therefore these industries need low- cost disposable chips to able to repeat the testing frequently without consuming high cost. One example of a low cost chip is an electrowetting chip which using the electrowetting technique where it is one of the microfluidic system techniques. It is used to manipulate the microdroplet such as transportation, mixing, separation and microdroplet generation. In this work, the development of a microfluidic chip is demonstrated using an electrowetting technique to automate the microdroplet transportation. The volume of droplet used is 5 µl. The shape of the electrode is designed and fabricated using a few layers of thin sheets consist of flexible cellulose thin sheet, adhesive transparent thin sheet, double-sided pressure-adhesive sheet and Aluminum, Al, thin film. The dimension of electrode is 0.2 cm x 1.5 cm (width x length). The lubricant oil is used to smoothen the surface of the electrode and become a dielectric medium in between electrode and droplet. The droplet used is made from potassium chloride (KCl) solution with conductivity of 1400 µS/m. During the experiment, the chip is connected to the AC power supply where the voltage and frequency are controlled. The result and analysis are made of the contact angle of droplet analysis, the velocity of droplet flow analysis and displacement of droplet analysis. With a power supply range of 8 Vpp – 14 Vpp, using 10 Hz of frequency, the droplet is able to flow along the activated electrode track. In conclusion, this work has successfully opened the window towards improving the transportation of microdroplet flow with automated transportation system under the operation of low voltage and frequency.

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