Micro Capillary Array Electrophoresis Chip by Moving Mask Liga Technology

Abstract

The concept and the fabrication process of a micro capillary array electrophoresis (µ-CAE) for DNA analysis were stated. The chip was mainly made of plastic and fabricated by the innovatory LIGA technology which included moving mask deep X-ray lithography, electroplating and hot embossing, and assembled by an adhesive bonding, in which the adhesive layer solidified and formed firm bond under UV exposure. The micro channel array with high aspect ratio is the key part, whose wall should have a slight inclination to ensure the demoulding. It was demonstrated that moving mask deep X-ray lithography (M 2 DXL) technology could successfully control the inclination and enabled to integrate micro optical components such as micro lens into the chip, which improved detection performance greatly. The fabrication process was experimented and some initial prototype chips have been obtained. Fluidic test and electrophoresis test with laser-induced fluorescence detection has been done on the prototype. The results confirm that the µ-CAE by moving mask LIGA process is realizable and it has great potential in high-throughput, which may lead to ultra-fast DNA analysis.