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Ultrasonic welding is a rapid, promising bonding method for the bonding of polymer chips; yet its use is still limited. We present two lab-on-a-chip applications where ultrasonic welding can be preferably applied: (1) self-aligned gapless bonding of a two-part chip with a tolerance of 50 μm; (2) bonding of a large area shallow chamber (1.8 cm(2) × 150 μm). Using injection moulding combined with ultrasonic welding we achieved a total production and bonding time of 60 s per chip, and a batch of chips could be produced within a day going from design to finished chips. We believe that the technical solutions offered here can significantly help bridge the gap between academia and industry, where the differences in production methods and materials pose a challenge when transferring technology.

A miniaturised array of supercritical angle fluorescence (SAF) micro-optics embedded in a microfluidic chamber was fabricated by injection moulding. The fabricated chip could enhance the fluorescence signal around 46 times compared to a conventional microscope. Collection of the fluorescence signal from the SAF array is almost independent of the numerical aperture, and the limit of detection was improved 36-fold using a simple and inexpensive optical detection system.

The invention relates to a replication tool (1, 1a, 1b) for producing a part (4) with a microscale textured replica surface (5a, 5b, 5c, 5d). The replication tool (1, 1a, 1b) comprises a tool surface (2a, 2b) defining a general shape of the item. The tool surface (2a, 2b) comprises a microscale structured master surface (3a, 3b, 3c, 3d) having a lateral master pattern and a vertical master profile. The microscale structured master surface (3a, 3b, 3c, 3d) has been provided by localized pulsed laser treatment to generate microscale phase explosions. A method for producing a part with microscale energy directors on flange portions thereof uses the replication tool (1, 1a, 1b) to form an item (4) with a general shape as defined by the tool surface (2a, 2b). The formed item (4) comprises a microscale textured replica surface (5a, 5b, 5c, 5d) with a lateral arrangement of polydisperse microscale protrusions. The microscale protrusions may be provided on a flange portion of a first part and are configured to act as energy directors when forming an ultrasonic joint with a cooperating flange portion of a second part.

The determination of pharmacokinetic properties of drugs, such as the distribution coefficient, D, is a crucial measurement in pharmaceutical research. Surprisingly, the conventional (gold standard) technique used for D measurements, the shake-flask method, is antiquated and unsuitable for the testing of valuable and scarce drug candidates. Herein we present a simple micro fluidic platform for the determination of distribution coefficients using droplet-based liquid-liquid extraction. For simplicity, this platform makes use of gravity to enable phase separation for analysis and is 48 times faster and uses 99 % less reagents than performing an equivalent measurement using the shake-flask method. Furthermore, the D measurements achieved in our platform are in good agreement with literature values measured using traditional shake-flask techniques. Since D is affected by volume ratios, we use the apparent acid dissociation constant, pK', as a proxy for inter-system comparison. Our platform determines a pK' value of 7.24 ± 0.15, compared to 7.25 ± 0.58 for the shake-flask method in our hands and 7.21 for the shake-flask method in literature. Devices are fabricated using injection moulding, the batch-wise fabrication time is less than 2 minutes per device (at a cost of 1 USD per device) and the inter-device reproducibility is high.

We present a new type of energy director (ED) for ultrasonic welding of microfluidic systems. These micropillar EDs are based on the replication of cone like protrusion structures introduced using a pico-second laser and may therefore be added to any mould surface accessible to a pico-second laser beam. The technology is demonstrated on an injection moulded microfluidic device featuring high-aspect ratio (h × w = 2000 μm × 550 μm) and free-standing channel walls, where bonding is achieved with no detectable channel deformation. The bonding strength is similar to conventional EDs and the fabricated system can withstand pressures of over 9.5 bar.

Rapid prototyping is desirable when developing products. One example of such a product is all-polymer, passive flow controlled lab-on-a-chip systems that are preferential when developing low-cost disposable chips for point-of-care use. In this paper we investigate the following aspects of going from rapid prototyping to pilot (mass) production. (1) Fabrication of an all-polymer microfluidic system using a rapid prototyped master insert for injection moulding and ultrasonic welding, including a systematic experimental characterisation of chip featured geometric capillary microvalve test structures. (2) Numerical modelling of the microvalve burst pressures. Numerical modelling of burst pressures is challenging due to its non-equilibrium nature. We have implemented and tested the level-set method modified with a damped driving term and show that the introduction of the damping term leads to numerically robust results with limited computational demands and a low number of iterations. Numerical and simplified analytical results are validated against the experimental results. We find that injection moulding and ultrasonic welding are effective for chip production and that the experimental burst pressures could be estimated with an average accuracy of 5% using the presented numerical model.

The invention relates to a replication tool (1) for producing an item (4) with enhanced wetting properties by fast replication, such as injection moulding or extrusion coating. The replication tool (1) comprises a tool surface (2a, 2b) defining a general shape of the item (4). The tool surface (2a, 2b) comprises a microscale structured master surface (3a, 3b, 3c) having a lateral master pattern and a vertical master profile. The microscale structured master surface (3a, 3b, 3c) has been provided by localized pulsed laser treatment to generate microscale phase explosions. A method of producing an item with enhanced wetting properties uses the replication tool (1) to form an item (4) with a general shape as defined by the tool surface. The formed item (4) comprises a microscale textured replica surface (5a, 5b, 5c) with a lateral arrangement of polydisperse microscale protrusions.

The invention relates to a replication tool (1) for producing a part (4) with a microscale textured replica surface (5a, 5b, 5c, 5d). The replication tool (1) comprises a tool surface (2a, 2b) defining a general shape of the item (4). The tool surface (2a, 2b) comprises a microscale structured master surface (3a, 3b, 3c, 3d) having a lateral master pattern and a vertical master profile. The microscale structured master surface (3a, 3b, 3c, 3d) has been provided by localized pulsed laser treatment to generate microscale phase explosions. A method for producing a part (4) with microscale energy directors on flange portions thereof uses the replication tool (1) to form an item (4) with a general shape as defined by the tool surface (2a, 2b). The formed item (4) comprises a microscale textured replica surface (5a, 5b, 5c, 5d) with a lateral arrangement of polydisperse microscale protrusions. The microscale protrusions may be provided on a flange portion of a first part (40) and are configured to act as energy directors when forming an ultrasonic joint with a cooperating flange portion of a second part (50).