Fracture strength of glass chips for high-pressure microfluidics

Abstract

High-pressure microfluidics exposes new areas in chemistry. In this paper, the reliability of transparent borosilicate glass chips is investigated. Two designs of circular cavities are used for fracture strength tests, either 1.6 mm wide with rounded corners to the fluid inlets, or 2.0 mm wide with sharp inlet corners. Two kinds of tests are done, either short-term, e.g. pressurization to fracture at room temperature, or long-term, with fracture at constant pressurization for up to one week, in the temperature region 11–125 °C. The speed of crack fronts is measured using a high-speed camera. Results show fracture stresses in the range of 129 and 254 MPa for short-term measurements. Long-term measurements conclude the presences of a temperature and stress dependent delayed fracture. For a reliability of one week at 11–38 °C, a pressure limit is found at the lower end of the short-term measurements, or 15% lower than the average. At 80 °C, this pressure limit is 45% lower. Crack speeds are measured to be 10−5 m s−1 during short-term fracture. These measurements are comparable with estimations based on slow crack growth and show that the growth affects the reliability of glass chips. This effect is strongly affected by high temperatures, thus lowers the operating window of high-pressure glass microfluidic devices.