Thermal heating and monitoring temperature of digital microfluidic (DMF) lab-on-a-chip on paper substrates has previously been investigated. In order to control temperature without external equipment, we developed temperature controller including temperature sensor and heaters on the paper-based DMF chip. Since we also wanted to actuate a droplet on the temperature controller, a rail pattern of electrodes (Fig. 1) was printed using an inkjet printer, Dimatix, with silver nanoparticle (AgNP) ink. Furthermore, a pair of heaters enclosing a temperature sensor was printed on the electrodes positions, forming the heating zone, as shown in Fig. 1, so that those three electrodes have simultaneous roles of: 1) actuated electrodes for DMF, 2) heater electrodes, and 3) temperature sensing electrodes. The temperature sensor was fabricated by printing the thermoelectric (TE) material, p-type PEDOT:PSS with AgNP electrode, forming the interfacial junction (inset in Fig. 1). As a result of depositing these two materials with Dimatix, the once printed AgNP layer was 1 um and the fifth printed PEDOT:PSS layer was 2 um (Fig. 2). This integrated configuration enables the heating process of droplets, in addition to the DMF five normal mechanical operations of dispensing, merging, mixing, splitting and transporting. The sensor showed a linear response with a Seebeck coefficient of 19.132 uV/K; demonstrating good usage as a temperature sensor for a DMF drop with on-chip monitoring. Furthermore, biochemical experiments will be conducted using the integrated heater-sensor DMF chip. |
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