An improved bulk acoustic waves chip based on a PDMS bonding layer for high-efficient particle enrichment

Abstract

In this work, we developed a feasible way to package bulk acoustic waves chip with sandwich structure by inserting a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) layer as the adhesive between cover glass and silicon substrate. After spin-coating and curing process, a PDMS layer was formed on one side of the cover glass and then bonded to the silicon substrate with microchannels by oxygen plasma treating. Both simulation and experiment showed that the chip was not leaking and the acoustic waves produced by the piezoelectric transducer could be propagated through the PDMS layer. Finally, a standing wave field was formed in the microchannels. Compared with traditional chip bonded by anodic bonding, simulation results showed that this packaging method did decrease the acoustic pressure in the channel, but the reduction was acceptable. After optimizing the experimental parameters, we successfully aggregated 15-μm silica spheres under a very low input power (21 dBm) at a flow velocity of 1 ml/h, and the enrichment efficiency of silica spheres was greater than 97%.