Digital microfluidic biochips: A vision for functional diversity and more than moore

Abstract

Abstract-Microfluidics-based biochips are revolutionizing highthroughput sequencing, parallel immunoassays, clinical diagnostics, and drug discovery. These devices enable the precise control of nanoliter volumes of biochemical samples and reagents. Compared to conventional laboratory procedures, which are cumbersome and expensive, miniaturized biochips offer the advantages of higher sensitivity, lower cost due to smaller sample and reagent volumes, system integration, and less likelihood of human error. This embedded tutorial paper provides an overview of droplet-based "digital" microfluidic biochips. It describes emerging computer-aided design (CAD) tools for the automated synthesis and optimization of biochips from bioassay protocols. Recent advances in fluidic-operation scheduling, module placement, droplet routing, pin-constrained chip design, and testing are presented.

Exact One-pass Synthesis of Digital Microfluidic Biochips

“…Biochemical assays, such as the dilution of samples and reagents, crystallization of protein molecules, on-chip chemistry for DNA sequencing, multiplexed real-time Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), protein crystallization for drug discovery, and glucose measurement for blood serum have successfully been implemented on such biochips [9].…”

“…In general, a DMFB consists of a two-dimensional electrode grid and peripheral devices such as optical detectors and dispensing ports (as schematically shown in Figure 1 [9]). The sample carriers, so called droplets, are miniaturized and discretized liquids which are controlled by underlying electrodes using electrical actuations (i. e. a principle called electrowetting-on-dielectric (EWOD) [11]).…”

Design Automation for Digital Microfluidic Biochips

“…Moreover, permanently-etched channels greatly restrict the feasibility and versatility. Therefore, microfluidic research is witnessing a paradigm shift from the continuous-flowbased architecture to droplet-based architecture or, in particular, the digital microfluidic biochip (DMFB) [6], [19], [20], [29], [46].…”

“…1 [19], [46]. The sample carriers, droplets, being miniaturized and discretized liquids, are controlled by underlying electrodes using electrical actuations (i.e., a principle called electrowetting-on-dielectric or EWOD) [38].…”

“…Similar growth is anticipated in other parts of the world, especially US and Japan. Continuing growth of various applications have dramatically complicated chip/system integration and design complexity [7], [19], [20], rendering traditional manual designs infeasible, especially under time-to-market constraints. Hence, it is necessary to develop high-quality computer-aided-design (CAD) tools for efficient design automation.…”