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Image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production
Micron-scale droplets isolated by an immiscible liquid can provide miniaturised reaction vessels which can be manipulated in microfluidic networks, and has seen a rapid growth in development. In many experiments, the precise volume of these microdroplets is a critical parameter which can be influenc...
Autores principales: | , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Nature Publishing Group UK
2017
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5585215/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28874820 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-11254-5 |
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author | Crawford, D. F. Smith, C. A. Whyte, G. |
author_facet | Crawford, D. F. Smith, C. A. Whyte, G. |
author_sort | Crawford, D. F. |
collection | PubMed |
description | Micron-scale droplets isolated by an immiscible liquid can provide miniaturised reaction vessels which can be manipulated in microfluidic networks, and has seen a rapid growth in development. In many experiments, the precise volume of these microdroplets is a critical parameter which can be influenced by many external factors. In this work, we demonstrate the combination of imaging-based feedback and pressure driven pumping to accurately control the size of microdroplets produced in a microfluidic device. The use of fast-response, pressure-driving pumps allows the microfluidic flow to be quickly and accurately changed, while directly measuring the droplet size allows the user to define the more meaningful parameters of droplet size and generation frequency rather than flow rates or pressures. The feedback loop enables the drift correction of pressure based pumps, and leads to a large increase in the mono-dispersity of the droplets produced over long periods. We also show how this can be extended to control multiple liquid flows, allowing the frequency of droplet formation or the average concentration of living cells per droplet to be controlled and kept constant. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-5585215 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2017 |
publisher | Nature Publishing Group UK |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-55852152017-09-06 Image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production Crawford, D. F. Smith, C. A. Whyte, G. Sci Rep Article Micron-scale droplets isolated by an immiscible liquid can provide miniaturised reaction vessels which can be manipulated in microfluidic networks, and has seen a rapid growth in development. In many experiments, the precise volume of these microdroplets is a critical parameter which can be influenced by many external factors. In this work, we demonstrate the combination of imaging-based feedback and pressure driven pumping to accurately control the size of microdroplets produced in a microfluidic device. The use of fast-response, pressure-driving pumps allows the microfluidic flow to be quickly and accurately changed, while directly measuring the droplet size allows the user to define the more meaningful parameters of droplet size and generation frequency rather than flow rates or pressures. The feedback loop enables the drift correction of pressure based pumps, and leads to a large increase in the mono-dispersity of the droplets produced over long periods. We also show how this can be extended to control multiple liquid flows, allowing the frequency of droplet formation or the average concentration of living cells per droplet to be controlled and kept constant. Nature Publishing Group UK 2017-09-05 /pmc/articles/PMC5585215/ /pubmed/28874820 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-11254-5 Text en © The Author(s) 2017 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
spellingShingle | Article Crawford, D. F. Smith, C. A. Whyte, G. Image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production |
title | Image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production |
title_full | Image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production |
title_fullStr | Image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production |
title_full_unstemmed | Image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production |
title_short | Image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production |
title_sort | image-based closed-loop feedback for highly mono-dispersed microdroplet production |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5585215/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28874820 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-11254-5 |
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