TY - GEN
T1 - An on-chip, electricity-free and single-layer pressure sensor for microfluidic applications
AU - Tsai, Chia-Hung
AU - Nakamura, Toshiki
AU - Kaneko, Makoto
PY - 2015/12/11
Y1 - 2015/12/11
N2 - A novel method for sensing local pressure inside a microfluidic device is proposed and developed. The main advantage of the method is that the pressure can be visually seen without attaching any electrical wire or instrument. The method can also be easily integrated into applications, such as micro-robots, because of its single-layer design. The working principle is based on the deformation of Polydimethylsiloxane, a kind of polymer that is often used in microfluidic systems. The deformation in the deformation chamber causes fluid to flow in, or out, the sensing area, and consequently results in changes of color intensity in the area. As a result, the pressure can be determined based on the brightness value over the sensing area. Experimental results show a highly correlated relationship between the measured brightness and pressure with the absolute correlation of 0.986. The hysteresis and drift of the proposed sensor are investigated, and are compared with our previously proposed microbeads approach. The prototype of the proposed sensor succeeded in performing measurement on local pressure in a microfluidic device with the resolution of 3.04 kPa.
AB - A novel method for sensing local pressure inside a microfluidic device is proposed and developed. The main advantage of the method is that the pressure can be visually seen without attaching any electrical wire or instrument. The method can also be easily integrated into applications, such as micro-robots, because of its single-layer design. The working principle is based on the deformation of Polydimethylsiloxane, a kind of polymer that is often used in microfluidic systems. The deformation in the deformation chamber causes fluid to flow in, or out, the sensing area, and consequently results in changes of color intensity in the area. As a result, the pressure can be determined based on the brightness value over the sensing area. Experimental results show a highly correlated relationship between the measured brightness and pressure with the absolute correlation of 0.986. The hysteresis and drift of the proposed sensor are investigated, and are compared with our previously proposed microbeads approach. The prototype of the proposed sensor succeeded in performing measurement on local pressure in a microfluidic device with the resolution of 3.04 kPa.
KW - Color
KW - Microchannels
KW - Pressure measurement
KW - Pressure sensors
KW - Robot sensing systems
KW - Semiconductor device measurement
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84958156026&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/IROS.2015.7353369
DO - 10.1109/IROS.2015.7353369
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:84958156026
T3 - IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems
SP - 165
EP - 170
BT - IROS Hamburg 2015 - Conference Digest
PB - Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
T2 - IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems, IROS 2015
Y2 - 28 September 2015 through 2 October 2015
ER -