Abstract
A pressure resistant and optically accessible deterministic lateral displacement (DLD) device was designed and microfabricated from silicon and glass for high-throughput fractionation of particles between 3.0 and 7.0 µm comprising array segments of varying tilt angles with a post size of 5 µm. The design was supported by computational fluid dynamic (CFD) simulations using OpenFOAM software. Simulations indicated a change in the critical particle diameter for fractionation at higher Reynolds numbers. This was experimentally confirmed by microparticle image velocimetry (µPIV) in the DLD device with tracer particles of 0.86 µm. At Reynolds numbers above 8 an asymmetric flow field pattern between posts could be observed. Furthermore, the new DLD device allowed successful fractionation of 2 µm and 5 µm fluorescent polystyrene particles at Re = 0.5–25.
Highlights
Pharmaceutical drugs with poor water solubility exhibit a size dependent resorption
Different methods have been implemented in microfluidics, such as fractionation in a spiral microchannel, multi-orifice flow fractionation (MOFF) and deterministic lateral displacement (DLD) [3,4]
As long as the particles are smaller than the first streamline, they will follow this streamline through the array and will not be displaced
Summary
Pharmaceutical drugs with poor water solubility exhibit a size dependent resorption. only a small range of particle sizes is suitable to ensure maximal efficacy of a specific particulate pharmaceutical drug. Another application of high-throughput microfluidic systems is the size dependent up-concentration of biological materials that behave as particles [2] To address these tasks, different methods have been implemented in microfluidics, such as fractionation in a spiral microchannel, multi-orifice flow fractionation (MOFF) and deterministic lateral displacement (DLD) [3,4]. To increase the range of particle siz(e1s) fractionated inside one array, it can be segmented changing either the gap between posts (g) or the tilt angle (θ) [2,5]. All published experimental works in the field of high-throughput DLDs rely on high-speed particle trajectory recording at the end of the array and observation of the fractionation at the outlets. ΜPIV measurements in DLD devices at elevated Re with seed particles smaller than 1 μm could be directly compared with CFD simulations
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