Design of microfluidic chip for transmission phase grating.

Abstract

Microfluidic techonology is the upcoming technology of systems that regulate small volumes of fluids ranging from 10-9 to 10-18 litres. It is an advancing technology with numerous applications in various disciplines such as molecular biology, microelectronics and chemistry. The levels of integration, complexity and miniaturization of microfluidic networks have been steadily increasing due to better materials and packaging technology. There are several vital advantages that microfluidic systems have such as the ability to make use of extremely small volumes of reagents for lab-on-chip applications, carry out experiments with high accuracy and sensitivity, severely reducing analysis time and cutting cost on experimental expenditure. The aim of this project is therefore to harness such advantages via various microfluidic techniques by designing an opto-fluidic microchip. This microfluidic chip can serve as an alternative to existing optical switches that uses other medium such as liquid crystals, electro-optic, thermo-optic or magneto-optic properties.