A Design of Digital Microfluidic Biochip along with Structural and Behavioural Features in Triangular Electrode Based Array

AbstractDigital microfluidic based biochip manoeuvres on the theory of microfluidic technology, having a broad variety of applications in chemistry, biology, environmental monitoring, military etc. Being concerned about the technological advancement in this domain, we have focused on equilateral triangular electrodes based DMFB systems. Accepting the associated design issues, here, we have addressed many facets of such electrodes regarding their structural and behavioural issues in comparison to the existing square electrodes. As the requisite voltage reduction is a key challenging design issues, to implement all the tasks using triangular electrodes that are possible in square electrode arrays as well, is a tedious job. Furthermore, to deal with this new design deploying triangular electrodes, we have analyzed all the necessary decisive factors including fluidic constraints to ensure safe droplet movements and other modular operations together with mixing and routing. Moreover, an algorithm has been developed to find a route for a given source and destination pair in this newly designed DMFB. Finally, we have included a comparative study between this new design and the existing one while encountering the above mentioned issues

Placement and routing for cross-referencing digital microfluidic biochips.

Xiao, Zigang."October 2010."Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2011.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 62-66).Abstracts in English and Chinese.Abstract --- p.iAcknowledgement --- p.viChapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1Chapter 1.1 --- Microfluidic Technology --- p.2Chapter 1.1.1 --- Continuous Flow Microfluidic System --- p.2Chapter 1.1.2 --- Digital Microfluidic System --- p.2Chapter 1.2 --- Pin-Constrained Biochips --- p.4Chapter 1.2.1 --- Droplet-Trace-Based Array Partitioning Method --- p.5Chapter 1.2.2 --- Broadcast-addressing Method --- p.5Chapter 1.2.3 --- Cross-Referencing Method --- p.6Chapter 1.2.3.1 --- Electrode Interference in Cross-Referencing Biochips --- p.7Chapter 1.3 --- Computer-Aided Design Techniques for Biochip --- p.8Chapter 1.4 --- Placement Problem in Biochips --- p.8Chapter 1.5 --- Droplet Routing Problem in Cross-Referencing Biochips --- p.11Chapter 1.6 --- Our Contributions --- p.14Chapter 1.7 --- Thesis Organization --- p.15Chapter 2 --- Literature Review --- p.16Chapter 2.1 --- Introduction --- p.16Chapter 2.2 --- Previous Works on Placement --- p.17Chapter 2.2.1 --- Basic Simulated Annealing --- p.17Chapter 2.2.2 --- Unified Synthesis Approach --- p.18Chapter 2.2.3 --- Droplet-Routing-Aware Unified Synthesis Approach --- p.19Chapter 2.2.4 --- Simulated Annealing Using T-tree Representation --- p.20Chapter 2.3 --- Previous Works on Routing --- p.21Chapter 2.3.1 --- Direct-Addressing Droplet Routing --- p.22Chapter 2.3.1.1 --- A* Search Method --- p.22Chapter 2.3.1.2 --- Open Shortest Path First Method --- p.23Chapter 2.3.1.3 --- A Two Phase Algorithm --- p.24Chapter 2.3.1.4 --- Network-Flow Based Method --- p.25Chapter 2.3.1.5 --- Bypassibility and Concession Method --- p.26Chapter 2.3.2 --- Cross-Referencing Droplet Routing --- p.28Chapter 2.3.2.1 --- Graph Coloring Method --- p.28Chapter 2.3.2.2 --- Clique Partitioning Method --- p.30Chapter 2.3.2.3 --- Progressive-ILP Method --- p.31Chapter 2.4 --- Conclusion --- p.32Chapter 3 --- CrossRouter for Cross-Referencing Biochip --- p.33Chapter 3.1 --- Introduction --- p.33Chapter 3.2 --- Problem Formulation --- p.34Chapter 3.3 --- Overview of Our Method --- p.35Chapter 3.4 --- Net Order Computation --- p.35Chapter 3.5 --- Propagation Stage --- p.36Chapter 3.5.1 --- Fluidic Constraint Check --- p.38Chapter 3.5.2 --- Electrode Constraint Check --- p.38Chapter 3.5.3 --- Handling 3-pin net --- p.44Chapter 3.5.4 --- Waste Reservoir --- p.45Chapter 3.6 --- Backtracking Stage --- p.45Chapter 3.7 --- Rip-up and Re-route Nets --- p.45Chapter 3.8 --- Experimental Results --- p.46Chapter 3.9 --- Conclusion --- p.47Chapter 4 --- Placement in Cross-Referencing Biochip --- p.49Chapter 4.1 --- Introduction --- p.49Chapter 4.2 --- Problem Formulation --- p.50Chapter 4.3 --- Overview of the method --- p.50Chapter 4.4 --- Dispenser and Reservoir Location Generation --- p.51Chapter 4.5 --- Solving Placement Problem Using ILP --- p.51Chapter 4.5.1 --- Constraints --- p.53Chapter 4.5.1.1 --- Validity of modules --- p.53Chapter 4.5.1.2 --- Non-overlapping and separation of Modules --- p.53Chapter 4.5.1.3 --- Droplet-Routing length constraint --- p.54Chapter 4.5.1.4 --- Optical detector resource constraint --- p.55Chapter 4.5.2 --- Objective --- p.55Chapter 4.5.3 --- Problem Partition --- p.56Chapter 4.6 --- Pin Assignment --- p.56Chapter 4.7 --- Experimental Results --- p.57Chapter 4.8 --- Conclusion --- p.59Chapter 5 --- Conclusion --- p.60Bibliography --- p.6

Droplet routing for digital microfluidic biochips based on microelectrode dot array architecture

A digital microfluidic biochip (DMFB) is a device that digitizes fluidic samples into tiny droplets and operates chemical processes on a single chip. Movement control of droplets can be realized by using electrowetting-on-dielectric (EWOD) technology. DMFBs have high configurability, high sensitivity, low cost and reduced human error as well as a promising future in the applications of point-of-care medical diagnostic, and DNA sequencing. As the demands of scalability, configurability and portability increase, a new DMFB architecture called Microelectrode Dot Array (MEDA) has been introduced recently to allow configurable electrodes shape and more precise control of droplets. The objective of this work is to investigate a routing algorithm which can not only handle the routing problem for traditional DMFBs, but also be able to route different sizes of droplets and incorporate diagonal movements for MEDA. The proposed droplet routing algorithm is based on 3D-A* search algorithm. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can reduce the maximum latest arrival time, average latest arrival time and total number of used cells. By enabling channel-based routing in MEDA, the equivalent total number of used cells can be significantly reduced. Compared to all existing algorithms, the proposed algorithm can achieve so far the least average latest arrival time

Abstracts of Papers Presented at the 2005 Pittsburgh Conference

To attend or not to attend, that is the question. The Pittsburgh Conference continues to pose this conundrum to conferees and exhibitors alike. This year's conference was the first to be presented without a set of paper abstracts—a good thing some would say but this old codger always used the paper abstracts to select papers of interest to our readership and to seek a full publication. The exhibit took its usual format but it seemed that there were less manufacturers present. The information presented to the attendees was also lacking and many companies' details were missing from the final program book, an omission no doubt on their behalf—my company was one of these—however I feel sure that past Pittcon organizers would have been more persistent in getting the required details for the audience. As is now the norm, many of the presentations take the form of posters displayed within the exhibition area. Without a driver to get the audience there, the traffic was slow, to say the least. Lecture presentations were also attended in a mixed fashion. So the Pittsburgh Conference show moves on, and again next year it will be held in Orlando from 12 March to 17 March 2006. No doubt I will be there making it a straight 31 in a row; in Pittsburgh Conference terms I am just a beginner with many of the attendees making more shows in a run than that. Selected abstracts dealing with topics of interest to the readers of this journal follow—hopefully many of these groups will be willing to publish their work either within this journal or elsewhere

Field-Effect Sensors

This Special Issue focuses on fundamental and applied research on different types of field-effect chemical sensors and biosensors. The topics include device concepts for field-effect sensors, their modeling, and theory as well as fabrication strategies. Field-effect sensors for biomedical analysis, food control, environmental monitoring, and the recording of neuronal and cell-based signals are discussed, among other factors

Droplet-Trace-Based Array Partitioning and a Pin Assignment Algorithm for the Automated Design of Digital Microfluidic Biochips

Microfluidics-based biochips combine electronics with biology to open new application areas such as point-of-care medical diagnostics, on-chip DNA analysis, and automated drug discovery. Bioassays are mapped to microfluidic arrays using synthesis tools, and they are executed through the manipulation of sample and reagent droplets by electrical means. Most prior work on CAD for biochips has assumed independent control of electrodes using a large number of (electrical) input pins. Such solutions are not feasible for low-cost disposable biochips that are envisaged for many field applications. A more promising design strategy is to divide the microfluidic array into smaller partitions and use a small number of electrodes to control the electrodes in each partition. We propose a partitioning algorithm based on the concept of “droplet trace”, which is extracted from the scheduling and droplet routing results produced by a synthesis tool. An efficient pin assignment method, referred to as the “Connect-5 algorithm”, is combined with the array partitioning technique based on droplet traces. The array partitioning and pin assignment methods are evaluated using a set of multiplexed bioassays

Using MapReduce Streaming for Distributed Life Simulation on the Cloud

Distributed software simulations are indispensable in the study of large-scale life models but often require the use of technically complex lower-level distributed computing frameworks, such as MPI. We propose to overcome the complexity challenge by applying the emerging MapReduce (MR) model to distributed life simulations and by running such simulations on the cloud. Technically, we design optimized MR streaming algorithms for discrete and continuous versions of Conway’s life according to a general MR streaming pattern. We chose life because it is simple enough as a testbed for MR’s applicability to a-life simulations and general enough to make our results applicable to various lattice-based a-life models. We implement and empirically evaluate our algorithms’ performance on Amazon’s Elastic MR cloud. Our experiments demonstrate that a single MR optimization technique called strip partitioning can reduce the execution time of continuous life simulations by 64%. To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to propose and evaluate MR streaming algorithms for lattice-based simulations. Our algorithms can serve as prototypes in the development of novel MR simulation algorithms for large-scale lattice-based a-life models.https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/scs_books/1014/thumbnail.jp