Current Development in Interdigital Transducer (IDT) Surface Acoustic Wave Devices for Live Cell In Vitro Studies: A Review

Acoustics have a wide range of uses, from noise-cancelling to ultrasonic imaging. There has been a surge in interest in developing acoustic-based approaches for biological and biomedical applications in the last decade. This review focused on the application of surface acoustic waves (SAW) based on interdigital transducers (IDT) for live-cell investigations, such as cell manipulation, cell separation, cell seeding, cell migration, cell characteristics, and cell behaviours. The approach is also known as acoustofluidic, because the SAW device is coupled with a microfluidic system that contains live cells. This article provides an overview of several forms of IDT of SAW devices on recently used cells. Conclusively, a brief viewpoint and overview of the future application of SAW techniques in live-cell investigations were presented.

A Water/Ion Separation Device: Theoretical and Numerical Investigation

An array of ion separation cells is presented in this work, to propose a novel desalination device. Molecular Dynamics simulations have been incorporated to establish the theoretical background and calculate all parameters that could lead the manufacturing step. The main system component is an ion separation cell, in which water/NaCl solution flows due to an external pressure difference and ions are directed towards the non-permeable walls under the effect of an electric field, with direction perpendicular to the flow. Clean water is gathered from the output, while the remaining, high-concentration water/ion solution is re-cycled in the cells. The strength of the electric field, cell dimensions, and wall/fluid interactions are investigated over a wide range, and shear viscosity and the volumetric flow rate are calculated for each case.

Functional Magnetite Nanoparticle: A Review on the Particles Lysis and Nucleic Acid Separation

The functional magnetite nanoparticles are one of the most important functional materials for nucleic acid separation. Cell lysis and magnetic separation are two essential steps involve in optimizing nucleic acid extraction using the magnetic beads method. Many coating materials, coupling agents, chemical cell lysis, and several methods have been proposed to produce the specific desired properties for nucleic acid extraction. The important properties, such as biocompatibility, stability, linking ability, hydrophobicity, and biodegradable, were considered. The appropriate coating material of magnetite core and coupling agent are necessary to give biomolecules a possibility to link with each other through chemical conjugation. In this review, progress in functional magnetite nanoparticles to optimize the high binding performance in nucleic acid extraction is discussed.

Latest Updates on the Advancement of Polymer-Based Biomicroelectromechanical Systems for Animal Cell Studies

Biological sciences have reached the fundamental unit of life: the cell. Ever-growing field of Biological Microelectromechanical Systems (BioMEMSs) is providing new frontiers in both fundamental cell research and various practical applications in cell-related studies. Among various functions of BioMEMS devices, some of the most fundamental processes that can be carried out in such platforms include cell sorting, cell separation, cell isolation or trapping, cell pairing, cell-cell communication, cell differentiation, cell identification, and cell culture. In this article, we review each mentioned application in great details highlighting the latest advancements in fabrication strategy, mechanism of operation, and application of these tools. Moreover, the review article covers the shortcomings of each specific application which can open windows of opportunity for improvement of these devices.

Direct medium-chain carboxylic-acid oil separation from a bioreactor by an electrodialysis/phase separation cell

Medium-chain carboxylic acids (MCCAs) are valuable platform chemicals with numerous industrial-scale applications. These MCCAs can be produced from waste biomass sources or syngas fermentation effluent through an anaerobic fermentation process called chain elongation. We have previously demonstrated successful approaches to separate >90%-purity oil with several MCCAs by integrating the anaerobic bioprocess with membrane-based liquid-liquid extraction (pertraction) and membrane electrolysis. However, membrane electrolysis without pertraction was not able to separate MCCA oil. Therefore, we developed an electrodialysis/phase separation cell (ED/PS) and evaluated whether it can function as a stand-alone extraction and separation unit. First, we tested an ED/PS cell, which, when evaluated in series with pertraction, achieved a maximum MCCA-oil flux of 1,665 g d-1 per projected area (m2) (19.3 mL oil d-1) and a MCCA-oil transfer efficiency [100%*moles MCCA-oil moles electrons-1] of 74% at 15 A m-2. This extraction system demonstrated a ∼10 times lower electric-power consumption of 1.05 kWh kg-1 MCCA oil when compared to membrane electrolysis in series with pertration (11.1 kWh kg-1 MCCA oil) at 15 A m-2. Second, we evaluated our ED/PS as a stand-alone unit when integrated with the anaerobic bioprocess (without pertraction), and demonstrated that we can selectively extract and separate MCCA oil directly from chain-elongating bioreactor broth with just an abiotic electrochemical cell. We assumed that such a stand-alone unit would reduce capital and operating costs, but electric-power consumption increased considerably due to the lower MCCA concentrations in the bioreactor broth compared to the pertraction broth. Only a full techno-economic analysis will be able to determine whether the use of the ED/PS cell should be as a stand-alone unit or after pertraction.

Facile Method for Fabricating Microfluidic Chip Integrated with Microwell Arrays for Cell Trapping

With the development of biomedical technology, personalized diagnosis and treatment at the single-cell level are becoming more important in the medical field. As one of the most powerful tools, microfluidic chips have shown significant potential for various applications related to cell separation, cell proliferation, and cell behavior analysis. However, fabricating microfluidic devices requires complicated procedures and high-cost equipment. In this study, an optofluidic maskless lithography method was proposed for rapid fabrication of microfluidic devices integrated with microwells. Through the use of this approach, microwells can be on-line designed and the exposure patterns can be modulated. Single or multi polystyrene microspheres were successfully trapped by using the designed microwells. The capture of MCF-7 cells and cell arrays indicated that the microfluidic devices fabricated in the present study can be applied for cell research.

Design Techniques for Microfluidic Devices Implementation Applicable to Chemical Analysis Systems

This chapter provides a guide for microfluidic devices development and optimization focused on chemical analysis applications, which includes medicine, biology, chemistry, and environmental monitoring, showing high-level performance associated with a specific functionality. Examples are chemical analysis, solid phase extraction, chromatography, immunoassay analysis, protein and DNA separation, cell sorting and manipulation, cellular biology, and mass spectrometry. In this chapter, most information is related to microfluidic devices design and fabrication used to perform several steps concerning chemical analysis, process preparation of reagents, samples reaction and detection, regarding water quality monitoring. These steps are especially relevant to lab-on-chip (LOC) and micro-total-analysis-systems (μTAS). μTAS devices are developed in order to simplify analytical chemist work, incorporating several analytical procedures into flow systems. In the case of miniaturized devices, the analysis time is reduced, and small volumes (nL) can be used.