Abstract
Background: Microfluidic cell manipulation techniques have been continually developed and integrated into miniature chips as a so-called lab-on-a-chip (LOC) platform for high-throughput bioassays. Among the various mechanisms of bioparticles manipulation by electrically induced forces, dielectrophoresis (DEP) has been regarded as the most promising technique utilized in microfluidic systems. Into the micro- to nano-scale level of DEP configuration, the common challenges of undesirable side effects such as electrohydrodynamic effects, joule heating, and electrolysis that may occur in the microfluidic system has always been a hurdle which would severely limit the DEP performance. Methods: A numerical simulation study was performed on a versatile capability of a rectangular type of dielectrophoresis microelectrode with different parametric design configuration variables (channel height: 20-50 µm; electrode width 20-100 µm; electrode spacing 5-50 µm). Results: Numerical study results have shown that the ideal dimension range of design configuration for optimum DEP performance have been identified to be 40µm in channel height, 20-40 µm in electrode width and 5-15µm in electrode spacing, further increasing of the dimensions have shown a decrease in DEP performance consequently abridged the bioparticle manipulation. Conclusion: This investigation of the parametric design of the rectangular geometry microelectrode has provided necessary insight to the microelectrode design information and parametric considerations for optimum DEP device fabrication and enhancement.
Highlights
Dielectrophoresis (DEP) has been proven as a versatile manipulation technique commonly used in a microfluidic platform[1]
It is because according to the DEP equation (1), the key influence in particle motion by DEP force was determined by the electric field gradient and the particle volume, which was defined by its radius
An electric field gradient was generated in the model as shown in Figure 3, by further input of different design variables into the study model such channel height, electrode width and electrode spacing and its parameters to study the optimization of the rectangular microelectrode and identify its optimum design parameters
Summary
Dielectrophoresis (DEP) has been proven as a versatile manipulation technique commonly used in a microfluidic platform[1]. To achieve of this, according to the equation (1), one of the optimizations of the microelectrodes geometry design that can be done is to design an electrode that can provide a higher electric field gradient to compensate the small particle radius[6]. A study was generated with electric current model that defines the electrical potential and it is conducted in a frequency domain (AC) The numerical results such as electrical potential distribution Vpp, electric field distribution V/m and electric field gradient ∇E2 were generated from this model. This numerical study was performed with 5 different channel height (20μm, 30μm, 40μm, 50μm) and with the input of different combination parameters of electrode width and electrode spacing as according to the Table 2
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