MICRO INJECTOR BASED ON DIGITAL DRIVE AND CONTROL FOR BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING

This paper reports a novel microfluidic system, by which microfluidic delivery, transport and control can be digitally realized in femtoliter scale. Microelectronic grade $N_2$ from a pressurized canister was passed through HPLC tubing into a micro injector. The micro injector was driven and controlled digitally by the control system that can apply various control parameters such as pulse frequencies. A front-end of micro nozzle was inserted the dyed oil to collect droplets injected. The diameter of a droplet was measured by a microscope and a CCD camera, and then its volume can be calculated on the assumption that the droplet is spherical. The micro nozzles were simply pulled in glass capillary tubes by the micro puller self-made, and the geometry parameters of the micro nozzles can be adjusted easily. Experiments have successfully been carried out, and the results demonstrated that the proposed digital micro injector possesses three significant advantages : precise ultra-small liquid volume in femtoliter scale, digital microfluidic control and micro devices fabricated by simple glass process, not based on IC process.