Today, microfabricated devices (microchips) have attracted considerable attention because of their vast applicability and versatility. 1,2 Most published reports utilizing microchips to separate and detect analysis of interest have concentrated on using electrokinetically driven separation schemes. [3][4][5][6][7] Investigations from a different standpoint have been few in number. 8,9 However, microchips offer advantages concerning the scale merits of microspace, such as a short diffusion distance and the high interface-to-volume ratio, the specific interface area; we thus considered that they are an ideal tool to study molecular transport between two different phases, i.e., solvent extraction.In the present paper, we report on the first demonstration using a microchip to study molecular transport between two phases.
ExperimentalWe have described the experimental apparatus and the principle of measurement for the thermal lens microscope (TLM) in detail previously. [10][11][12] The excitation beam was an Ar + laser of 488.0 nm which was mechanically chopped by a light chopper at 1.69 kHz. The probe beam was a He-Ne laser of 632.8 nm. Two laser beams were introduced coaxially into an optical microscope and tightly focused into a sample in a microchannel (100 µm×150 µm cross section) by an 20×0.65 NA objective lens. The excitation beam passing through the sample was separated from the probe beam by an optical narrow band-pass filter and a diffraction grating. The intensity of the transmitted probe beam after passing through a pinhole was detected by a photodiode. The photodiode current, amplified by a low-noise preamplifier (×100), was fed into a lock-in amplifier.The fabrication method for our glass chip was also previously published.11,12 Figure 1 shows the layout and dimensions of the glass chip.Nickel(II) chloride, dimethylglyoxime, ethanol, sodium acetate, acetic acid, hydrochloric acid, and chloroform were obtained from Wako Pure Chemical Industries, Ltd. and were used as received. Chloroform was of analytical grade. The other chemicals were of guaranteed grade, and the water used was from a Millipore Milli-Q system. A 2.5 mM nickel(II) stock solution was prepared by dissolving nickel(II) chloride in a small amount of hydrochloric acid and diluting with water. Aqueous solutions of Ni(II) were prepared at concentrations of 2.5 -50 µM by successive dilution with water. A stock solution of dimethylglyoxime was prepared by dissolving dimethylglyoxime in a small amount of ethanol and diluting to 1 mM with water. An aqueous buffer solution was prepared as follows. Acetic acid (2.4 ml) and 12.25 mg of sodium acetate were mixed and diluted to 250 ml with water. The Ni-complex sample solutions were prepared with a 1:1:1 mixing volume ratio of the nickel(II) solution, buffer solution and dimethylglyoxime solution.
Results and DiscussionA Ni-dimethylglyoxime complex solution and chloroform in each reservoir were introduced into the solvent-extraction region by suction, as shown in Fig. 1. The two solutions did not mix w...