High-volume fabrication of sylgard 184 devices for single cell analytics

Several lab-on-chip prototypes rely on PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane) processed with laborious lithographic techniques. Upscaling the manufacturing volumes requires typically material change which increases the market entry time and costs. As a solution, a novel, high-volume fabrication method called Roll-to-Roll PDMS thermal imprinting is presented. This study demonstrates high accuracy and high volume (480 chips/h) replication of microwells for single cell RNA sequencing (Seq-Well). Sealing of these devices with semipermeable membrane followed by lysis of compartmentalized human cells is further shown.