Joan M Cabot, PhD, LEITAT Technology Center, Barcelona, SPAIN
In biosensing, bio-receptors are immobilized and labeled on the surface requiring specific manual steps. Microfluidics have paved the way for packing these lab-tasks together in a point-of-care (POC) device. However, conventional microfabrication techniques are tedious, expensive and requires cleanroom facilities [1,2]. To overcome these limitations, 3D printing (3DP) offers a rapid and inexpensive prototyping allowing the conversion of a computer-assisted design (CAD) into a physical object in a single process with 3D flow distribution and multilevel format. Despite these advantages, 3DP printing request a feasible design for testing and in most cases, researchers end-up using a trial-error approach [3-5]. In this study, we used 3D multiphase flow simulations to go beyond trial-error fabrication. From the outputs of the simulation, 3D printed microfluidic chips were fabricated for its subsequent testing. Using this approach, the optimum design can be found in a quicker and more efficient way, accelerate the time-to-market, and reduce the operation costs of the entire process (figure). Besides, the performance of different printer technologies was evaluated in terms of feature size, accuracy, and suitability for mass manufacturing
