The first report of micromachined devices that emulate the functions of laboratory chemical instrumentation, the silicon gas chromatograph, occurred over four decades ago.  Due largely to the modest performance of these early devices, further developments in microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) based chemical instrumentation were slow to materialize.  Microfabricated fluidic devices that accomplished chemical measurement strategies were first reported in the early 1990s and demonstrated significant advantages over conventional approaches. Since that time there has been rapidly growing interest in microfabricated fluidic devices (microfluidic chips).  The diversity of chemical and biochemical measurement techniques that have been implemented on micro- or nanofabricated devices is significant, in both the research literature and commercial products.  Current activities in our laboratory fall into four categories; microfluidic chemical separations with integrated nano-electrospray, microfluidic digital assay devices, nanofluidic devices for single molecule DNA characterization, and MEMS-based mass spectrometry components that enable the realization of handheld mass spectrometers.  Selected topics will be discussed in this presentation.

Adventures in miniaturizing chemical and biochemical measurement tools

ACS Fall 2021

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