Thin-film thermal system for nucleic acid amplification in digital microfluidics

Abstract

Digital microfluidics system is a powerful platform to realise true lab-on-a-chip. While most biological applications have delicate temperature requirements, integration of a thermal system with microfluidics has become an obstacle for system minimization for applications in point-of-cares. In this paper, we developed a heating plate on glass based on thin-film technology, which is fully compatible with glass substrate-based digital microfluidic chip. The thin-film heating plate and the digital microfluidic chip were controlled with a customized driver circuit. We have carried out characterization experiments to verify the on-chip temperature uniformity and heating rate. We have demonstrated both Polymerase Chain Reaction and Recombinase Polymerase Amplification experiments with the proposed system. This work opens up a new way for portable glass-based digital microfluidic chips with a fully integrated thermal system.