Nathalie Horner – Page 3 – Lab on a Chip Blog

Author Archive

LOC article on using protein repellent coatings to decrease CNT biosensor response times in the press

15 Mar 2012

C2LC21020G graphical abstract The recent Lab on a Chip article from Vincent Remcho and colleagues at Oregon State University and UC Santa Barbara has been highlighted on several scientific news sites. The article describes the team’s work designing a protein repellent coating to enhance protein flux, a factor which strongly affects biosensor response time. The results demonstrate a new methodology for characterizing nanoelectronic biosensor performance, and demonstrate a mass transport optimization strategy that is applicable to a wide range of microfluidic based biosensors.

Congratulations to the authors!

Read the articles on Science Daily, PhysOrg.com and nanowerk.com or go straight to the Lab on a Chip paper:

Increasing the detection speed of an all-electronic real-time biosensor
Matthew R. Leyden , Robert J. Messinger , Canan Schuman , Tal Sharf , Vincent T. Remcho , Todd M. Squires and Ethan D. Minot
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC21020G

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New YouTube videos

13 Mar 2012

View the new videos on the Lab on a Chip YouTube site below:

Concentration landscape generators for shear free dynamic chemical stimulation

Microfluidic platform for combinatorial synthesis in picolitre droplets

Pulsed laser triggered high speed microfluidic fluorescence activated cell sorter

Controlled generation of submicron emulsion droplets via highly stable tip-streaming mode in microfluidic devices

Experimental validation of plugging during drop formation in a T-junction

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LOC Issue 7 available now

13 Mar 2012

Issue 7 is now available online, and the outside front cover features a HOT article by Aldo Jesorka and colleagues at Chalmers University of Technology, describing their use of a hydrodynamically confined microflow pipette as an optimized non-contact open-volume microfluidic tool, to overcome the common restriction of using closed microchannels.

A multifunctional pipette
Alar Ainla, Gavin D. M. Jeffries, Ralf Brune, Owe Orwar and Aldo Jesorka
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC20906C

Issue 7 inside front cover The inside front cover is a Critical Review by David Beebe et al., discussing the use of PDMS and polystyrene by researchers working at the interface of microfluidics and cell biology research:

Engineers are from PDMS-land, Biologists are from Polystyrenia
Erwin Berthier, Edmond W. K. Young and David Beebe
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC20982A

Another HOT article in this issue is by Serge G. Lemay and colleagues at the MESA+ Institute for Nanotechnology, University of Twente, reporting on their study of the response time of nanofluidic thin-layer cells as electrochemical sensors, and suggested means of improving that time.

Response time of nanofluidic electrochemical sensors
Shuo Kang, Klaus Mathwig and Serge G. Lemay
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC21104A

This issue also features the latest article in our Acoustofluidics series, by Thomas Laurell and colleagues at Lund University, Applications of acoustophoresis in continuous flow microsystems; and our latest Research Highlights from Ali Khademhosseini and colleagues.

Read the rest of Issue 7 here

As usual, all our HOT articles are free to access for four weeks (following a simple registration for individual users).

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Genetic testing? We’ve got an app for that

12 Mar 2012

US scientists have developed a device dubbed Gene-Z for point-of-care genetic testing using a smartphone interface that has realistic commercial potential.

The device, made by Robert Stedtfeld at Michigan State University and colleagues, is cheap, with an estimated manufacture cost of less than $350. It’s small, about the size of a tablet computer, and weighs less than a bag of sugar. And, you can operate it via an app on a smartphone.

The Gene-Z device

The team’s prototype consists of a disposable plastic chip with four arrays containing the dried primers required for a genetic assay, allowing parallel processing of four samples with multiple genetic markers for accurate disease diagnosis. The chip sits in an aluminium heater bed, through which LEDs are fed for real-time optical detection, and the whole thing is encased in sleek black packaging with a dock for an iPod Touch or iPhone.

Holger Becker, co-founder of microfluidic ChipShop, Germany, is impressed. ‘I like it for a couple of reasons,’ he says, ‘it’s not over-engineered, it addresses a couple of very typical problems in a point-of-care diagnostic device and there is a simplicity in the approach, especially in the detection system.’

The team made two major changes to existing designs, explains team member Syed Hashsham. First, they made the disposable microfluidic chip from polyester, rather than the more traditional silicon or polydimethylsiloxane. Hashsham says he was inspired by ‘kitchen chemistry’. If plastic food bags can be sealed to keep your sandwiches fresh, he reasoned, then plastic membranes in the chip would stop samples escaping during loading. This avoids the need for mechanical valves and the plastic chips are easy to design and fabricate. You can think one up in the morning and use it in the afternoon, he says, whereas silicon chips take weeks to develop.

Second, the team rejected polymerase chain reactions (PCR) in favour of the loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) assay. The LAMP assay requires no thermal cycling, requires cheaper optics for detection and is robust – as opposed to PCR, which Hashsham describes as ‘finicky’. Finally, they used WiFi and a smartphone with a custom-built app as the interface to manage data from the device.

Using WiFi does throw up a couple of problems, however: the safe transmission of potentially sensitive patient data via a wireless network, use in hospital settings where signals can interfere with other equipment and viability in areas without an internet connection. Stedtfeld and his team are working with other groups to address the encryption and interference issues. They say that their next step is to make the Gene-Z device compatible with an ordinary mobile phone, so that information can be transmitted via SMS and, by adding solar cells, the device could be used in rural settings.

Gene-Z: a device for point of care genetic testing using a smartphone
Robert D. Stedtfeld, Dieter M. Tourlousse, Gregoire Seyrig, Tiffany M. Stedtfeld, Maggie Kronlein, Scott Price, Farhan Ahmad, Erdogan Gulari, James M. Tiedje and Syed A. Hashsham
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC21226A

Read the original article at Chemistry World

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New YouTube Videos

24 Feb 2012

View the new videos on the Lab on a Chip YouTube site below:

Tailoring the interface of hybrid microresonators in viscid fluids enhances their quality factor by two orders of magnitude

Continuous separation of microparticles in a microfluidic channel via the elasto-inertial effect of non-Newtonian fluid

A single-channel microparticle sieve based on Brownian ratchets

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Pioneers of Miniaturisation Lecture 2012: call for nominations

24 Feb 2012

microTAS 2012 The Pioneers of Miniaturisation Lecture is awarded annually to an early to mid-career scientist for extraordinary or outstanding contributions to the understanding or development of miniaturised systems. This year’s presentation of the award will take place during the µTAS 2012 Conference in Okinawa, Japan, in October 2012. The Lectureship is jointly awarded by the Lab on a Chip and Corning Incorporated and includes $5000 ($2000 of which may be used to attend the µTAS Symposium).

Nominations are now invited for this award – the deadline for nominations is 28th May 2012. Full details of the criteria and how to submit the nominations are to be found on the Pioneers of Miniaturisation Lecture webpage.

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LOC Issue 6 just published

24 Feb 2012

Issue 6 is now available online, and the outside front cover features a HOT article by Govind Kaigala and colleagues at IBM Research in Zürich on micro-immunohistochemistry (μIHC) using a microfluidic probe to extract more high-quality information from tissue sections for use in drug discovery and clinical pathology.

Micro-immunohistochemistry using a microfluidic probe
Robert D. Lovchik, Govind V. Kaigala, Marios Georgiadis and Emmanuel Delamarche
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC21016A

Issue 6 inside front cover The inside front cover features another HOT article, from Douglas Weibel and colleagues at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of California, San Diego, describing very simple, portable microfluidic technology for determining the minimum inhibitory concentration of antibiotics.

A self-loading microfluidic device for determining the minimum inhibitory concentration of antibiotics
Nate J. Cira, Jack Y. Ho, Megan E. Dueck and Douglas B. Weibel
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC20887C

The issue also includes the Focus article ‘Standards for collecting microfluidic devices?‘ by Henne van Heeren at enablingMNT, discussing the need for standards for microfluidic interconnections, chip dimensions and a vocabulary, the latest article in our Acoustofluidics series on the acoustic radiation force on small particles by Henrik Bruus at the Technical University of Denmark, and the following HOT articles:

Sorting cells by size, shape and deformability
Jason P. Beech, Stefan H. Holm, Karl Adolfsson and Jonas O. Tegenfeldt
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC21083E

A microfluidic method to study demulsification kinetics
Thomas Krebs, Karin Schroen and Remko Boom
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC20930F

Design considerations for electrostatic microvalves with applications in poly(dimethylsiloxane)-based microfluidics
Amit V. Desai, Joshua D. Tice, Christopher A. Apblett and Paul J. A. Kenis
DOI: 10.1039/C2LC21133E

All our HOT articles are free to access for four weeks (following a simple registration for individual users).