Movable Drawer Microfluidic Device for Contamination Control
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing biological sample preparation and treatment devices face challenges with complex structures, contamination issues, and difficulty in handling small volumes of reagents due to miniaturization, leading to inefficiencies and high costs in manufacturing and operation.
Innovation Solution
A device comprising a base and a movable drawer with storage and reaction chambers, featuring fluid communication means and a microfluidic chip for precise fluid transfer and detection, designed for automated assembly and operation, ensuring hermeticity and robust execution of complex biological protocols.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If disposable containers with integrated reagents are used, then contamination between tests is reduced, but manufacturing cost increases due to the need for advanced materials
Solution Approach 1:
The device is divided into separate components: a drawer containing chambers with reagents and a base with detection means. This segmentation allows the drawer to be a simple, inexpensive disposable component while the expensive detection means remain in the reusable base, resolving the contradiction between contamination prevention and manufacturing cost.
Solution Approach 2:
The drawer containing the chambers is designed as a disposable component that can be easily manufactured from basic plastics. After use, the entire drawer is discarded, ensuring contamination prevention without requiring expensive materials or complex manufacturing processes for the disposable portion.
2Volume of moving object
If miniaturization is applied to reduce device size, then handling efficiency improves, but reagent stability deteriorates due to evaporation through chamber walls
Solution Approach 1:
Reagents are prepared and stored in the chambers before the device is assembled. The drawer is pre-filled with reagents in liquid form, and the device is designed to minimize exposure time. This preliminary preparation allows the use of simple plastic chambers without requiring long-term hermeticity, as the reagents are used quickly after assembly.
Solution Approach 2:
The reagents are extracted from their original storage containers and transferred into the device chambers immediately before use. This extraction approach allows the use of simple plastic chambers for short-term storage, avoiding the need for expensive hermetic materials while maintaining reagent stability through timely usage.
3Manufacturing precision
If complex fluid communication structures are used between chambers, then fluid transfer precision improves, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The device uses pressure differential mechanisms to control fluid transfer between chambers. By applying pressure to specific chambers, reagents are forced through simple openings in the partition walls into adjacent chambers. This pneumatic approach achieves precise fluid transfer without requiring complex mechanical structures, valves, or pumps in the disposable drawer.
Solution Approach 2:
The device controls fluid transfer by changing pressure parameters in different chambers. By varying the pressure in source chambers, reagents are driven through simple openings at controlled rates. This parameter-based control achieves precise fluid communication with minimal structural complexity.
Data Source
AI summary
A device for preparing and/or treating a biological sample including an assembly of storage chambers and/or reaction chambers intended for receiving a fluid, the chambers being separated by walls so as to form an assembly of adjacent chambers. The device includes a base and a drawer including the assembly of adjacent chambers, the drawer being movable in relation to the base, the drawer including a contact surface connected to first means for establishing fluid communication connected to the inside of at least one chamber, the contact surface of the drawer being intended to be positioned facing a contact surface of the base including at least one position at which second means for fluid communication connected to detection means are placed.