Microfluidic in-Channel Growth of 3-D Nanostructures and Their Applications

Microfluidic In-channel Growth of 3-D Nanostructures and Their Applications

 Joseph Parisi, Yu Lei

Department of Chemical, Materials, & Biomolecular Engineering, University of Connecticut, 191 Auditorium Road, Unit 3222, Storrs, Connecticut 06269

            Microfluidic devices have been used in many different applications and have continued to display their ability to shrink large scale experiments into small scale devices.  Experiments ranging from cell detectors to microreactors have successfully been implement in microfluidic devices, however there are many areas where the benefits of microfluidic devices have yet to be fully researched.  Our work focuses on in-situ preparation of 3-D nanostructured electrodes within a microfluidic channel.  These nanostructures are fabricated in a fraction of the time of traditional lithography, CVD and hydrothermal techniques, require less material and limits any complicated fabrication steps.  The true novelty of the device is in its ability to be immediately ready for in-channel detection of chemical or biological species without the need for alignment steps or mounting the structures on a suitable surface.