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Conveyance of helium–neon laser, polymer liquid and polystyrene (PS) beads through microoptofluidic channels of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)

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Abstract

In this work, the simultaneous conveyance of light, liquid, and microbeads in microoptofluidic channels was investigated experimentally. Based on soft lithography, the microoptofluidic channels were made of transparent polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) with length of ~3 cm, height of ~134 μm, width of ~210 μm, and refractive index of light (n) of 1.41–1.42. These channels were intended to have the different bent angles (θ b) from 15° to 90° and radii (R) of curvature from 0 to 10 mm, respectively. The colorless liquid polymer of Norland Optical Adhesive (NOA 89) was used as the core material of the channels. The NOA 89 had a higher n than that of PDMS to be capable of generating the total internal reflection of light with a collective angle (θ collect) 20°–21° and numerical aperture ~0.54. Using helium–neon (HeNe) red laser at a wavelength of 633 nm, the characterization of optical illumination showed that the optical losses of LCWs strongly depended on their bending degree with 0.056–0.060 dB/cm°. Finally, we demonstrated the motion of light delivered by microfluidic flows at an average speed of ~1 mm/s and the motion of 20-μm-diameter polystyrene beads at a flowing speed ~5 μm/s. The developed LCWs here may be further realized for a promising application on tracking and visualization of small objects such as cells within biological microsystems in the future.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to the Research Center for MEMS and Precision Machines at the National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences (KUAS) for access to major fabrication equipment.

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  1. Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Kaohsiung University of Applied Sciences, No. 415, Chien-Kung Road, Kaohsiung, 80778, Taiwan, ROC

    Chin-Tai Chen & Wen-Che Sun

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  1. Chin-Tai Chen
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  2. Wen-Che Sun
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Correspondence to Chin-Tai Chen.

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Chen, CT., Sun, WC. Conveyance of helium–neon laser, polymer liquid and polystyrene (PS) beads through microoptofluidic channels of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS). Microfluid Nanofluid 19, 245–250 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10404-015-1549-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10404-015-1549-5

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