Flexible microfluidic bio-lab-on-a-chip multi-sensor platform for electrochemical measurements

Abstract

A novel polymeric microfluidic multi-sensor system has been developed using rapid prototyping techniques and low-cost materials which permits the dynamic online monitoring of several cell culture parameters in a wide range of biomedical applications. The multi-sensor is made of polymeric flexible substrate with integrated gold microband electrodes for electrochemical measurements of Dissolved Oxygen (DO) and Hydrogen (H+), Sodium (Na+) and Potassium (K+) cations. The platform integrates several working electrodes (WE), pseudoreferences (pRE) and a counter electrode (CE) for electrochemical detection. The bio-lab-on-a-chip allows the detection of changes in real time, with rapid response, allowing to measure small volumes and fast cell metabolisms changes. The reliable analytical performance of the platform in in-vitro conditions has been demonstrated. DO was detected with activated gold electrode, and H+, Na+ and K+ were detected with the developed ion-selective microelectrodes (μISE) using electropolymerized polypyrrole (PPy) film as a contact layer, allowing a good performance of the sensor.