3d Printed Microfluidic Devices

This book is a printed edition of the Special Issue "3D Printed Microfluidic Devices" that was published in Micromachines

3D printing has revolutionized the microfabrication prototyping workflow over the past few years. With the recent improvements in 3D printing technologies, highly complex microfluidic devices can be fabricated via single-step, rapid, and cost-effective protocols as a promising alternative to the time consuming, costly and sophisticated traditional cleanroom fabrication. Microfluidic devices have enabled a wide range of biochemical and clinical applications, such as cancer screening, micro-physiological system engineering, high-throughput drug testing, and point-of-care diagnostics. Using 3D printing fabrication technologies, alteration of the design features is significantly easier than traditional fabrication, enabling agile iterative design and facilitating rapid prototyping. This can make microfluidic technology more accessible to researchers in various fields and accelerates innovation in the field of microfluidics. Accordingly, this Special Issue seeks to showcase research papers, short communications, and review articles that focus on novel methodological developments in 3D printing and its use for various biochemical and biomedical applications.

Microfluidics or lab-on-a-chip (LOC) is an important technology suitable for numerous applications from drug delivery to tissue engineering. Microfluidic devices for biomedical applications discusses the fundamentals of microfluidics and explores in detail a wide range of medical applications. The first part of the book reviews the fundamentals of microfluidic technologies for biomedical applications with chapters focussing on the materials and methods for microfabrication, microfluidic actuation mechanisms and digital microfluidic technologies. Chapters in part two examine applications in drug discovery and controlled-delivery including micro needles. Part three considers applications of microfluidic devices in cellular analysis and manipulation, tissue engineering and their role in developing tissue scaffolds and stem cell engineering. The final part of the book covers the applications of microfluidic devices in diagnostic sensing, including genetic analysis, low-cost bioassays, viral detection, and radio chemical synthesis. Microfluidic devices for biomedical applications is an essential reference for medical device manufacturers, scientists and researchers concerned with microfluidics in the field of biomedical applications and life-science industries.

Microfluidics for Biological Applications provides researchers and scientists in the biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and life science industries with an introduction to the basics of microfluidics and also discusses how to link these technologies to various biological applications at the industrial and academic level. Readers will gain insight into a wide variety of biological applications for microfluidics. The material presented here is divided into four parts, Part I gives perspective on the history and development of microfluidic technologies, Part II presents overviews on how microfluidic systems have been used to study and manipulate specific classes of components, Part III focuses on specific biological applications of microfluidics: biodefense, diagnostics, high throughput screening, and tissue engineering and finally Part IV concludes with a discussion of emerging trends in the microfluidics field and the current challenges to the growth and continuing success of the field.

Responding to the need for an affordable, easy-to-read textbook that introduces microfluidics to undergraduate and postgraduate students, this concise book will provide a broad overview of the important theoretical and practical aspects of microfluidics and lab-on-a-chip, as well as its applications.

A comprehensive resource on techniques and applications for immobilizing catalysts Catalyst Immobilization: Methods and Applications covers catalyst immobilization topics including technologies, materials, characterization, chemical activity, and recyclability. The book also presents innovative applications for supported catalysts, such as flow chemistry and machine-assisted organic synthesis. Written by an international panel of expert contributors, this book outlines the general principles of catalyst immobilization and explores different types of supports employed in catalyst heterogenization. The book?s chapters examine the immobilization of chiral organocatalysts, reactions in flow reactors, 3D printed devices for catalytic systems, and more. Catalyst Immobilization offers a modern vision and a broad and critical view of this exciting field. This important book: -Offers a guide to supported and therefore recyclable catalysts, which is one of the most important tools for developing a highly sustainable chemistry -Presents various immobilization techniques and applications -Explores new trends, such as 3D printed devices for catalytic systems -Contains information from a leading international team of authors Written for catalytic chemists, organic chemists, process engineers, biochemists, surface chemists, materials scientists, analytical chemists, Catalyst Immobilization: Methods and Applications presents the latest developments and includes a review of the innovative trends such as flow chemistry, reactions in microreactors, and beyond.

Stories behind essential microfluidic devices, from the inkjet printer to DNA sequencing chip. Hidden from view, microfluidics underlies a variety of devices that are essential to our lives, from inkjet printers to glucometers for the monitoring of diabetes. Microfluidics—which refers to the technology of miniature fluidic devices and the study of fluids at submillimeter levels—is invisible to most of us because it is hidden beneath ingenious user interfaces. In this book, Albert Folch, a leading researcher in microfluidics, describes the development and use of key microfluidic devices. He explains not only the technology but also the efforts, teams, places, and circumstances that enabled these inventions. Folch reports, for example, that the inkjet printer was one of the first microfluidic devices invented, and traces its roots back to nineteenth-century discoveries in the behavior of fluid jets. He also describes how rapid speed microfluidic DNA sequencers have enabled the sequencing of animal, plant, and microbial species genomes; organs on chips facilitate direct tests of drugs on human tissue, leapfrogging over the usual stage of animal testing; at-home pregnancy tests are based on clever microfluidic principles; microfluidics can be used to detect cancer cells in the early stages of metastasis; and the same technology that shoots droplets of ink on paper in inkjet printers enables 3D printers to dispense layers of polymers. Folch tells the stories behind these devices in an engaging style, accessible to nonspecialists. More than 100 color illustrations show readers amazing images of microfluids under the microscope.

The many intriguing examples on the application of mechatronics reinforce the excitement of this creative field of technology. As a collection they present a stimulating resource to developers of future mechatronics technology, and to educators searching for interesting examples. From structured-light measurement of the build-up of detritus on railway bogies and detection of uncracked spores of Chinese medicine to a practical tractor vision guidance system embedded in a smart-phone application, the practical applications of mechatronics and machine vision abound. Fruits are counted on the tree, pasture biomass is measured and a robot collects camel dung as a resource. 3D printing is in vogue, but papers here discuss the construction and strategy of the printer itself. The measurement and analysis of myoelectric muscle signals enable a prosthesis to be controlled and a feeding robot is used for patient care. An exoskeleton has both soft and rigid links and an optical sensor analyses the tissue into which a surgical needle is being inserted. These are some of the papers in this collection from the 26th annual conference on Mechatronics and Machine Vision in Practice, carefully selected to exclude papers that are merely theoretical and to highlight those that show practical verification. Papers have been contributed from China, New Zealand, the Philippines, Emirates, Germany and of course Australia.