Hot Articles – Page 20 – Lab on a Chip Blog

Archive for the ‘Hot Articles’ Category

HOT article: a miniaturized pump for on-chip pressure separations

25 Aug 2011

Debashis Dutta, University of Wyoming, and J. Michael Ramsey, University of North Carolina, have developed a microfluidic device with a miniaturized hydraulic pump capable of performing pressure-driven separations.

The microfluidics-based liquid chromatographic system can also inject samples and has a response time in the order of 100 ms, offering a significant advantage over those with external pumps and correspondingly large dead volumes and equilibration times.

As with all our hot articles, this one’s free to access for 4 weeks – why not take a look:

A microfluidic device for performing pressure-driven separations
Debashis Dutta and J. Michael Ramsey
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20329K

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HOT: cheap PDMS biochip with integrated cell positioning for imaging live cells with TIRF microscopy

25 Aug 2011

A cheap PDMS biochip has been developed by Roland Thuenauer and Alois Sonnleitner, Center for Advanced Bioanalysis, Austria, that enables the recording of individual vesicle fusion events at the apical membrane of live cells.

The cells can be grown to polarize directly on the device and then correctly placed by an integrated micro-positioning system in order to perform apical TIRF microscopy, without the need for an additional weight to force the apical membrane of the cells into the region of the evanescent wave.

As with all our hot articles, this one’s free to access for 4 weeks – why not take a look:

A PDMS-based biochip with integrated sub-micrometre position control for TIRF microscopy of the apical cell membrane
Roland Thuenauer, Kata Juhasz, Reinhard Mayr, Thomas Frühwirth, Anna-Maria Lipp, Zsolt Balogi and Alois Sonnleitner
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20458K

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HOT: a centrifuge on a chip and next-generation integrated microfluidics

09 Aug 2011

A microfluidic chip that can mimic the functions of a centrifuge without moving parts or external forces has been designed by Dino Di Carlo and colleagues from the University of California, Los Angeles. The Centrifuge-on-a-Chip uses fluid vortices to trap cells, and has been demonstrated to be effective in enriching rare cells from heterogeneous solutions and for performing labelling assays on-chip.

Automated cellular sample preparation using a Centrifuge-on-a-Chip
Albert J. Mach, Jae Hyun Kim, Armin Arshi, Soojung Claire Hur and Dino Di Carlo
Lab Chip, 2011, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20330D

Shuichi Takayama and collaborators at the University of Michigan have provided a brief overview of current challenges associated with integrated microfluidic circuits – covering parallel, serial and embedded instruction devices as well as device architecture, and providing an outlook for the next generation of ICMs.

Next-generation integrated microfluidic circuits
Bobak Mosadegh, Tommaso Bersano-Begey, Joong Yull Park, Mark A. Burns and Shuichi Takayama
Lab Chip, 2011, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20387H

Both HOT articles are free to access for 4 weeks, so why not take a look today?

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Lab on a Chip paper on artificial lung in the press

28 Jul 2011

Joseph Potkay‘s recently published Lab on a Chip paper on an artificial lung capable of using air rather than pure oxygen has been causing quite a stir! The article which describes the efficient lung mimic has been picked up by media outlets around the world:

New artificial lung breathes like a real one

New bioinspired artificial lung is efficient enough to operate on air

Researchers create artificial lung that works with air rather than pure oxygen

A New Artificial Lung Can Breathe Regular Air Rather Than Purified Oxygen

Artificial lungs to work sans oxygen

For the full details of this exciting new technology why not take a look at the paper:

Bio-inspired, efficient, artificial lung employing air as the ventilating gas
Joseph A. Potkay, Michael Magnetta, Abigail Vinson and Brian Cmolik
Lab Chip, 2011, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20020H

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A light-induced reversible switch for droplet production and μFlowFISH on the cover of Issue 16

27 Jul 2011

The image on the outside front cover of Issue 16 shows the method developed by Damien Baigl, Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris, and colleagues to reversibly switch from a continuous two-phase laminar flow to a droplet generating regime in microfluidic chips. They have achieved this by incorporating a photosensitive surfactant into the aqueous phase.

Photoreversible fragmentation of a liquid interface for micro-droplet generation by light actuation
Antoine Diguet, Hao Li, Nicolas Queyriaux, Yong Chen and Damien Baigl
Lab Chip, 2011, 11, 2666-2669

On the inside front cover we have μFlowFISH – an integrated microfluidic device capable of performing 16S rRNA fluorescence in situ hybridization with flow cytometric detection for identifying bacteria. The device developed by Anup K. Singh, Sandia National Laboratories and colleagues at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories was tested in a highly contaminated site using species involved in Cr(VI) remediation and was proved capable of quantitative detection of low numbers of microbial cells from complex samples.

Microfluidic fluorescence in situ hybridization and flow cytometry (μFlowFISH)
Peng Liu, Robert J. Meagher, Yooli K. Light, Suzan Yilmaz, Romy Chakraborty, Adam P. Arkin, Terry C. Hazen and Anup K. Singh
Lab Chip, 2011, 11, 2673-2679

View the rest of the issue, which includes the first in the series of Research Highlight articles from Ali Khademhosseini, reviewing the current literature in miniaturisation and related technologies, a Critical Review from Daniel T. Chiu on transitioning disposable microfluidic substrates from the lab into the clinic and a Focus article from Helene Andersson Svahn on massively parallel sequencing platforms.

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HOT: A self-heating cartridge for molecular diagnostics

21 Jul 2011

A disposable, water-activated, self-heating, easy-to-use, device for nucleic acid amplification and fluorescent detection has been developed by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania.

The device, which is the work of Haim H. Bau and colleagues, is self-contained, does not require any special instruments to operate and integrates chemical, water-triggered, exothermic heating with temperature regulation using a phase-change material (PCM) and isothermal nucleic acid amplification. The water flows into the exothermic reactor by wicking through a porous paper.

The device was shown to amplify and detect E. coli DNA and could detect as few as 10 target molecules in a sample. Future applications of this technology could include pathogen detection in blood, saliva, urine, food and water, and in settings far removed from the laboratory.

To find out more read the full article here

A self-heating cartridge for molecular diagnostics Changchun Liu, Michael G. Mauk, Robert Hart, Xianbo Qiu and Haim H. Bau

Lab Chip, 2011, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20345B

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On the cover: Teflon microreactors, fabric chips and droplets with removable shells

13 Jul 2011

On the front cover of Issue 15 we have a HOT article from Klavs Jensen and colleagues at MIT on a Teflon stack microreactor with a piezoelectric actuator. The microreactor has been developed to handle syntheses that are prone to clogging – such as palladium-catalyzed C–N cross-coupling reactions which form insoluble salts as by-products.

A Teflon microreactor with integrated piezoelectric actuator to handle solid forming reactions
Simon Kuhn, Timothy Noël, Lei Gu, Patrick L. Heider and Klavs F. Jensen
Lab Chip, 2011, 11, 2488-2492
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20337A

On the inside front cover is another HOT article from Dhananjaya Dendukuri and colleagues at Achira Labs Pvt. Ltd., India who have constructed a scalable microfluidic device by weaving silk to form a fabric chip.

‘Fab-Chips’: a versatile, fabric-based platform for low-cost, rapid and multiplexed diagnostics
Paridhi Bhandari, Tanya Narahari and Dhananjaya Dendukuri
Lab Chip, 2011, 11, 2493-2499
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20373H

And finally the back cover features an article from Shih-Kang Fan and Chiun-Hsun Chen demonstrating a parallel-plate device capable of generating water-core and oil-shell encapsulated droplets and subsequent removal of the oil shells.

Encapsulated droplets with metered and removable oil shells by electrowetting and dielectrophoresis
Shih-Kang Fan, Yao-Wen Hsu and Chiun-Hsun Chen
Lab Chip, 2011, 11, 2500-2508
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20142E

View the rest of the issue online here

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HOT: introducing the iMAP – an integrated microfluidic array plate

11 Jul 2011

The latest innovation in microfluidic cell assay platforms is here! Capable of triple analysis with low cell numbers, the iMAP is the answer to your cellular and molecular analysis quandaries.

Key features of iMAP v1.0:

interfaced on-board gravity driven flow
open access input fluid exchange
a highly efficient sedimentation based cell capture mechanism

The integrated microfluidic array plate has been developed by Luke Lee, University of California, Berkeley, and colleagues at Dublin City University, Sogang University and Universidad de Valparaíso, Chile. Download the article for the full details, it’s free to access for four weeks.

Integrated microfluidic array plate (iMAP) for cellular and molecular analysis
Ivan K. Dimov, Gregor Kijanka, Younggeun Park, Jens Ducrée, Taewook Kang and Luke P. Lee
Lab Chip, 2011, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20105K

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Artificial photosynthesis on a chip and 3D particle foccussing on the cover of issue 14

29 Jun 2011

The two striking images on the cover of Issue 14 are from Chan Beum Park and Tony Jun Huang.

The image on the outside front cover depicts a microfluidic artificial photosynthesis platform created by Chan Beum Park‘s group at KAIST. The platform which incorporates quantum dots and redox enzymes is capable of enzymatic synthesis of L-glutamate following light-driven NADH regeneration, similar to photosynthesis in green plants.

Artificial photosynthesis on a chip: microfluidic cofactor regeneration and photoenzymatic synthesis under visible light
Joon Seok Lee, Sahng Ha Lee, Jae Hong Kim and Chan Beum Park
Lab Chip, 2011, 11, 2309-2311
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20303G

Highlighted on the inside front cover is another exciting article, demonstrating the 3D focussing of particles in a microfluidic channel using standing surface acoustic waves. The paper builds on previous work from Tony Jun Huang‘s team at Penn State which had achieved 2D control of particles using the technique.

Three-dimensional continuous particle focusing in a microfluidic channel via standing surface acoustic waves (SSAW)
Jinjie Shi, Shahrzad Yazdi, Sz-Chin Steven Lin, Xiaoyun Ding, I-Kao Chiang, Kendra Sharp and Tony Jun Huang
Lab Chip, 2011, 11, 2319-2324
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20042A

View the issue here

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HOT: a quick, cheap method for fabricating microwells for cell cultures

24 Jun 2011

A new method to fabricate microwells for lab-on-a-chip scale high-throughput screening is demonstrated in this HOT article. Whereas previous manufacturing processes can be long, costly and require a lot of equipment, this technique is relatively simple and cheap.

By using a laser to pattern a polyester film coated with silicone glue, Ali Khademhosseini, Harvard-MIT, and colleagues have successfully demonstrated the fabrication of hundreds of microwells in a matter of minutes. The diameter of the microwells can be controlled by adjusting laser speed and power, and the well depth can be increased by stacking layers of film.

Download the article to read more – it’s free to access for the next 4 weeks:

Microfabricated polyester conical microwells for cell culture applications
Šeila Selimović, Francesco Piraino, Hojae Bae, Marco Rasponi, Alberto Redaelli and Ali Khademhosseini
Lab Chip, 2011, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/C1LC20213H

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