While there is a steady growth in the number of microfluidics applications, the search for an optimal material that delivers the diverse characteristics needed for the numerous tasks is still nowhere close to being settled. Often overlooked and still underrepresented, the thiol−ene family of polymer materials has an enormous potential for applications in organs-on-a-chip, droplet productions, microanalytics, and point of care testing. In this review, the main characteristics of the thiol−ene materials are given, and advantages and drawbacks with respect to their potential in microfluidic chip fabrication are critically assessed. Select applications, which exploit the versatility of the thiol−ene polymers, are presented and discussed. It is concluded that, in particular, the rapid prototyping possibility combined with the material's resulting mechanical strength, solvent resistance, and biocompatibility, as well as the inherently easy surface functionalization, are strong factors to make thiol−ene polymers strong contenders for promising future materials for many biological, clinical, and technical labon-a-chip applications.

We render thiol-ene polymers exceptionally solvent resistant by applying heat post-fabrication. The method is simple, effective, and universal for various thiol-enes and solvents.

The structural shift of a DNA hairpin-dimer is as important as the DNA sequence in determining the fluorescent properties of DNA-stabilized silver nanoclusters (DNA/AgNCs).

Fluorescent, DNA‐stabilized silver nanoclusters (DNA‐AgNCs) are applied in a range of applications within nanoscience and nanotechnology. However, their diverse optical properties, mechanism of formation, and aspects of their composition remain unexplored, making the rational design of nanocluster probes challenging. Herein, a synthetic procedure is described for obtaining a high yield of emissive DNA‐AgNCs with a C‐loop hairpin DNA sequence, with subsequent purification by size‐exclusion chromatography (SEC). Through a combination of optical spectroscopy, gel electrophoresis, inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP‐MS), and small‐angle X‐ray scattering (SAXS) in conjunction with the systematic study of various DNA sequences, the low‐resolution structure and mechanism of the formation of AgNCs were investigated. Data indicate that fluorescent DNA‐AgNCs self‐assemble by a head‐to‐head binding of two DNA hairpins, bridged by a silver nanocluster, resulting in the modelling of a dimeric structure harboring an Ag12 cluster.