Manipulating nanoliter fluid circuits on an all-glass chip by the magnetic field

Abstract

Actively controlled nanoliter fluid circuits are an urgently needed technology in electronics, biomedicine, chemical synthesis, and biosensing. The difficulty lies in how to drive the microfluid in an isolated and airtight manner in glass wafer. We used a magnetic oscillator pump to realize the switching of the circulation direction and controlling the flow rate of the 10nL fluid. Results of two-dimensional numerical simulations shows that the flow field can reach a steady state and a stable flow can be obtained. The contribution of each vibration cycle to the flow rate is proportional to the frequency, decays exponentially with the viscosity, is proportional to the 4.2 power of the amplitude, and is proportional to the radius. Compared with the existing fluid technology, this technology realizes the steering and flow control of a fully enclosed magnetic control fluid circuit as small as 10nL in hard materials for the first time.