Design and optimization of non-clogging counter-flow microconcentrator for enriching epidermoid cervical carcinoma cells.

Clogging failure is common for microfilters in living cells concentration; for instance, the CaSki Cell-lines (Epidermoid cervical carcinoma cells) utilizing the flat membrane structure. In order to avoid the clogging, counter-flow concentration units with turbine blade-like micropillar are proposed in microconcentrator design. Due to the unusual geometrical-profiles and extraordinary microfluidic performance, the cells blocking does not occur even at permeate entrances. A counter-flow microconcentrator was designed, with both processing layer and collecting layer arranged in terms of the fractal based honeycomb structure. The device was optimized by coupling Artificial Neuron Network (ANN) and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). The excellent concentration ratio of a final microconcentrator was presented in numerical results.

Fully integrated micro-separator with soft-magnetic micro-pillar arrays for filtrating lymphocytes.

A fully integrated micro-separator with soft-magnetic micro-pillar arrays has been developed, which merely employs one independent Lab-On-Chip to realize the lymphocytes isolation from the human whole blood. The simulation, fabrication and experiment are executed to realize this novel microseparator. The simulation results show that, the soft-magnetic micro-pillars array can amplify and redistribute the electromagnetic field generated by the microcoils. The tests certify desirable separation efficiency can be realized using this new separator at low current. No extra cooling system is required for such a micro-separator. This micro-separator can also be used to separate other target cells or particles with the same principle.