Droplets actuating chip based on electrowetting-on-dielectric

Abstract

A droplet-based actuating chip by using the method of electrowetting-on-dielectric (EWOD) was developed to manipulate the microfluidics. Here, the actuation mechanism of the sandwiched-configuration EWOD chips was carefully studied, and the movement of droplets was numerically analyzed by using the computational fluidic software, CFD-ACE+. The fabrication of the chip, including a heavily phosphorus-doped poly-silicon micro-electrode array and a thermally grown SiO₂ dielectric layer, was exploited to improve the chip stability and decrease the actuation voltage. In experiments, the transportation of a deionized droplet of about 0.5 μL is successfully achieved in air by applying the low voltage of 45 V.

Keywords

microfluidic chip, EWOD, surface tension, micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS)