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New ‘monolithic’ templates and improved protocols for soft lithography and microchip fabrication

2006; IOP Publishing; Volume: 18; Issue: 18 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1088/0953-8984/18/18/s12

1361-648X

Antoine Pallandre, Debjani Pal, Bertrand de Lambert, Jean‐Louis Viovy, Claus Fütterer,

Microfluidic and Capillary Electrophoresis Applications

We report a new method for fast prototyping and fabrication of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) and plastic microfluidic chips. These methods share in common the preparation of monolithic masters which includes the fabrication of the planar support, the 'negative pattern' of the microchannels and the fluidic connectors. The monolithic templates are extremely robust compared to conventional ones made of silicon and SU-8, and easier to produce and cheaper than all-silicon or electroplated templates. In contrast to the above-mentioned methods, our process allows one to cast both micrometre- (e.g. the microchannel) and millimetre-sized structures (e.g. the fluidic connection to the outer world) in a single fabrication step. The 'monolithic template' strategy can be used to fabricate both elastomeric (e.g. poly(dimethyl siloxane (PDMS)) polyester thermoset masters and glassy polymeric (e.g. cyclic olefin copolymer (COC)) devices. In this study we also report on one step fabrication of elastomer chips and on surface modifications of the above mentioned monolithically fabricated masters in order to improve separation of the chip from the template.