Droplet array with microfluidic concentration gradient (DA-MCG) for 2-dimensional reaction condition screening

Abstract

Droplet microfluidic technology can use each microdroplet as a microreactor, which has the advantages of low reagent dosage, less cross contamination, and fast reaction time. Combining concentration gradient generation with droplet formation and capture to form a two-dimensional reaction condition screening platform (including reactant concentration and reaction time) is expected to broaden the application range of microfluidic screening. In this work, a microfluidic chip that can dynamically generate and capture microdroplets and form static microdroplet array was designed and fabricated. An optimized Christmas tree structure by adjusting the horizontal channel length ratio was used to generate a chemical concentration gradient while obtaining a uniform outlet flow rate, forming a droplet array with different concentrations. The performance of droplet array with microfluidic concentration gradient (DA-MCG) was verified using sodium fluorescein as a model reagent. The chromogenic reaction of NaOH and phenolphthalein, and luminol chemiluminescence reaction were used to verify the two-dimensional screening ability of DA-MCG. The results indicated that the DA-MCG has the potential to be applied in the field of multi-dimensional drug screening.