Fabrication and Application in Microfluidics of Novel Transparent Preceramic Polymer Derived Glass Microcannels and Substrates

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Generally, glass-based microfluidics with the chemical inertness and thermal stability have widely used, while plastics including PDMS have showed their convenience in fabricating microfluidic devices. Therefore, one can simply anticipate that it must be desirable to combine the reliable properties of the glass material and the economic processibility of the plastics. In this point of view, it is an interesting fact that most preceramic polymers convert into the unique inorganic and organic hybrid phase. Moreover, the polymers have been fabricated using near-net shape processing techniques. In this report we have described the fabrication and microfluidic application of preceramic polymer-derived transparent, solvent resistant, thermally stable and bio-compatible microchannels and substrates. The simple micromolding technique was used to fabricate channels by thermal and photo crosslinking of a commercially available poly(vinyl silazane) or hydridopolycarbosilane. Both thermal and photo cured polymer channels were found to possess unique glass-like characteristics, such as transparency and chemical inertness. Also, the cured preceramic polymers were used to explore direct patterning or printing of proteins. Finally, we demonstrated the organic chemical synthesis and photochemical reactions using the fabricated micro-reactors. The novel materials is promising to replace the cost-consuming glass microfluidics or/and for the development of integrated microfluidic systems.

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Journal: TechConnect Briefs
Volume: 3, Technical Proceedings of the 2007 NSTI Nanotechnology Conference and Trade Show, Volume 3
Published: May 20, 2007
Pages: 411 - 414
Industry sector: Sensors, MEMS, Electronics
Topic: Micro & Bio Fluidics, Lab-on-Chip
ISBN: 1-4200-6184-4