A fluid propelling apparatus, including a plastic compound, a MEMS at least partially surrounded by the compound, and a heat sink next to the MEMS, to transfer heat away from the MEMS, wherein the heat sink is at least partly surrounded by the compound.

At least one electrode is integrated on a lab on a chip cartridge in a sample preparation chamber of the cartridge, a DNA hybridization chamber of the cartridge, a protein assay chamber of the cartridge, and/or a detection chamber of the cartridge, for example, where the electrode is used to generate pH electrochemically in order to activate, deactivate, or intermediately attenuate an enzyme's activity on demand, in order to increase the fidelity of analyte detection, for cell lysis, for protein extraction, for DNA dehybridization, for primer hybridization control, for sample pre concentration, and/or for washing to remove non target species.

Devices for sequencing biopolymers, methods of manufacturing the devices, and methods of using the devices are disclosed. In one example, such a device has a nanopore and a horizontal nanochannel. In some embodiments, the horizontal nanochannel may take a tortuous path. In some embodiments, such a device includes gas or air bubble generators or pressure pulse generators to block or unblock the horizontal nanochannel.

According to various aspects and embodiments, an integrated sensor system is provided. In one example, such an integrated sensor system includes at least one unit cell, an analysis device, and a controller. The at least one unit cell may include an activation chamber containing an activation fluid, a biological chamber containing a biological component, a first membrane disposed in between the activation chamber and the biological chamber, an assay chamber configured to receive a sample, and a second membrane disposed in between the assay chamber and the biological chamber.

The invention is directed to a droplet actuator device and methods for integrating gel electrophoresis analysis with pre or post-analytical sample handling as well as other molecular analysis processes. Using digital microfluidics technology, the droplet actuator device and methods of the invention provide the ability to perform gel electrophoresis and liquid handling operations on a single integrated device. The integrated liquid handling operations may be used to prepare and deliver samples to the electrophoresis gel, capture and subsequently process products of the electrophoresis gel or perform additional assays on the same sample materials which are analyzed by gel electrophoresis. In one embodiment, one or more molecular assays, such as nucleic acid (e.g., DNA) quantification by real-time PCR, and one or more sample processing operations such as sample dilution is performed on a droplet actuator integrated with an electrophoresis gel. In one embodiment, an electrophoresis gel may be integrated on the top substrate of the droplet actuator.

Embodiments disclosed herein are directed to microfluidic devices that allow for scalable on-chip screening of combinatorial libraries and methods of use thereof. Droplets comprising individual molecular species to be screened are loaded onto the microfluidic device. The droplets are labeled by methods known in the art, including but not limited to barcoding, such that the molecular species in each droplet can be uniquely identified. The device randomly sorts the droplets into individual microwells of an array of microwells designed to hold a certain number of individual droplets in order to derive combinations of the various molecular species. The paired droplets are then merged in parallel to form merged droplets in each microwell, thereby avoiding issues associated with single stream merging. Each microwell is then scanned, e.g., using microscopy, such as high content imaging microscopy, to detect the optical labels, thereby identifying the combination of molecular species in each microwell.

A disposable and inexpensive biological diagnostic cartridge for the amplification and detection of nucleic acids includes a configuration having a reaction pouch for amplification which is compressed by a flexible pump pouch for detection of the amplified reaction.

A system may comprise a voltage upconverter, a universal serial bus (USB) connector to receive an input voltage from a USB port on a computing device, and a microfluidic diagnostic chip communication link to electrically couple the voltage upconverter to a microfluidic diagnostic chip wherein the voltage upconverter is to convert the input voltage to be received by the USB connector to an output voltage sufficient to drive a pump on the microfluidic diagnostic chip. A diagnostic system may comprise a microfluidic diagnostic chip comprising a pump and a voltage upconverter to receive an input voltage from a universal serial bus (USB) port of a computing device and to convert the input voltage into an output voltage that powers activation of the pump.

In order to carry out various analyses at high accuracy in a site where analysis is needed using a disposable microchip, the microchip is disposed on a display of a tablet terminal device, and a sample or specimen is dropped into a flow path of the microchip to trigger a reaction of the sample in the microchip. Light emitted from the display of the tablet terminal device is applied to the microchip, and the reaction caused by the applied light in the microchip is measured. When an induced fluorescence method using the applied light is adopted as a measuring method, fluorescence that corresponds to the reaction is observed, and detected by, for example, a built-in camera of the tablet terminal device. The detection signal is analyzed by an arithmetic unit of the tablet terminal device.

A method of fabricating an elastomeric structure, comprising: forming a first elastomeric layer on top of a first micromachined mold, the first micromachined mold having a first raised protrusion which forms a first recess extending along a bottom surface of the first elastomeric layer; forming a second elastomeric layer on top of a second micromachined mold, the second micromachined mold having a second raised protrusion which forms a second recess extending along a bottom surface of the second elastomeric layer; bonding the bottom surface of the second elastomeric layer onto a top surface of the first elastomeric layer such that a control channel forms in the second recess between the first and second elastomeric layers; and positioning the first elastomeric layer on top of a planar substrate such that a flow channel forms in the first recess between the first elastomeric layer and the planar substrate.