Large-area, high-aspect-ratio SU-8 molds for the fabrication of PDMS microfluidic devices

Abstract

A relatively low-cost fabrication method using soft lithography and molding for large-area, high-aspect-ratio microfluidic devices, which have traditionally been difficult to fabricate, has been developed and is presented in this work. The fabrication process includes novel but simple modifications of conventional microfabrication steps and can be performed in any standard microfabrication facility. Specifically, the fabrication and testing of a microfluidic device for continuous flow deposition of bio-molecules in an array format are presented. The array layout requires high-aspect-ratio elastomeric channels that are 350 µm tall, extend more than 10 cm across the substrate and are separated by as little as 20 µm. The mold from which these channels were fabricated consisted of high-quality, 335 µm tall SU-8 structures with a high-negative aspect ratio of 17 on a 150 mm silicon wafer and was produced using spin coating and UV-lithography. Several unique processing steps are introduced into the lithographic patterning to eliminate many of the problems experienced when fabricating tall, high-aspect-ratio SU-8 structures. In particular, techniques are used to ensure uniform molds, both in height and quality, that are fully developed even in the deep negative-aspect-ratio areas, have no leftover films at the top of the structures caused by overexposure and no bowing or angled sidewalls from diffraction of the applied UV light. Successful microfluidic device creation was demonstrated using these molds by casting, curing and bonding a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) elastomer. A unique microfluidic device, requiring these stringent geometries, for continuous flow printing of a linear array of 16 protein and antibody spots has been demonstrated and validated by using surface plasmon resonance imaging of printed arrays.