#lab-on-a-chip

[bpod-bpod]

Spread on Chips

A micropatterned chip that mimics the natural conditions of tumour spread into surrounding tissue in 3D. Invasive (metastatic) potential of cancer cells can be measured, and therapeutics screened

Read the published research article here

Still from a video from work by Smiti Bhattacharya and colleagues

Barbara T. Murphy Division of Nephrology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York; Department of Mechanical Engineering, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA

Video originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Published in Science Advances, August 2024

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[cailynnjohnson]

From Lab-on-a-Chip to Industrial Innovation: Milestones in Microfluidic Technology

The global market for microfluidic products surged to $9.98 billion in 2019, with microfluidic devices accounting for $3.48 billion of this figure. A notable trend in the industry is the ongoing acquisition of microfluidic companies by larger enterprises, signaling a trajectory of accelerated growth through capital infusion.

In the industrial landscape, in vitro diagnostics (IVD) stands out as the primary sector for microfluidic applications, driven by its lucrative returns. Demographic shifts, particularly aging populations, contribute to an escalating demand for microfluidic chips. Moreover, governmental policies prioritize the advancement of the microfluidics industry, a focus that has intensified amidst the backdrop of the pandemic. Moving forward, the critical hurdles facing microfluidic chip technology revolve around manufacturing costs and scalability. Achieving scalable production processes and cost reduction measures while maintaining product standardization and minimizing variations are imperative objectives.

The evolution of modern technology emphasizes miniaturization, integration, and intelligence. Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) have played a pivotal role in this evolution, enabling the transition from bulky electronic systems to compact integrated circuit chips and handheld devices like smartphones. Similarly, microfluidic chips, often referred to as Lab-on-a-Chip technology, epitomize the manipulation of fluids at micro- and nanoscales. These chips condense essential laboratory functionalities, such as sample preparation, reaction, separation, and detection, onto a compact chip, typically a few square centimeters in size. The hallmark of microfluidic chips lies in their capacity for flexible integration and scaling of diverse unit technologies within a controllable microplatform.

Originating from MEMS technology, early microfluidic chips underwent fabrication processes on substrates like silicon, metals, polymers, glass, and quartz. These processes yielded microstructure units such as fluid channels, reaction chambers, filters, and sensors, with dimensions ranging from micrometers to sub-millimeters. Subsequent fluid manipulation within these microstructures enabled automated execution of biological laboratory procedures, including extraction, amplification, labeling, separation, and analysis, or cell manipulation and analysis.

In the early 1990s, A. Manz et al. demonstrated the potential of microfluidic chips as analytical chemistry tools by achieving electrophoretic separation—a technique previously confined to capillaries—on chips. Subsequently, spurred by the U.S. Department of Defense's requisition for portable biochemical self-test equipment, research in microfluidic chips burgeoned globally. Throughout the 1990s, microfluidic chips primarily served as platforms for analytical chemistry, often interchangeably referred to as "Micro Total Analysis Systems" (u-TAS). Consequently, these chips found applications across diverse fields, including biomedical diagnostics, food safety, environmental monitoring, forensics, military, and aerospace sciences.

Key milestones in the advancement of microfluidic chips include G. Whitesides et al.'s 2000 publication on PDMS soft lithography and S. Quake et al.'s 2002 article on "large-scale integration of microfluidic chips" featuring microvalve and micropump controls. These seminal works propelled microfluidic chips beyond the confines of traditional analytical systems, unlocking their potential for significant scientific and industrial applications. For instance, microfluidic chips enable the execution of combinatorial chemical reactions or droplet techniques, facilitating drug synthesis, high-throughput screening, and large-scale nanoparticle or microsphere production. In essence, microfluidic chips pave the way for the realization of a "chemical plant or pharmaceutical lab on a chip."

[techninja]

Miniaturizing Innovation: Exploring the Microfluidics Market

In the realm of life sciences and healthcare, the Microfluidics market is emerging as a transformative force, enabling researchers and clinicians to miniaturize laboratory processes and revolutionize diagnostics and therapeutics. This article delves into the burgeoning field of microfluidics, its applications in biomedical research and diagnostics, and its potential to reshape the healthcare landscape.

Microfluidics, the science of manipulating fluids at the microscale, offers a versatile platform for a wide range of applications, from drug discovery and genomics to point-of-care diagnostics and personalized medicine. By leveraging the unique physics and mechanics of fluid flow at small scales, microfluidic devices enable precise control over sample volumes, reaction kinetics, and experimental workflows.

The Microfluidics market encompasses an extensive array of technologies, including lab-on-a-chip devices, microfluidic pumps, valves, and sensors, as well as integrated systems for automated sample preparation and analysis. These miniaturized platforms offer numerous advantages over traditional laboratory techniques, including reduced sample and reagent consumption, faster analysis times, and increased sensitivity and throughput.

One of the key drivers propelling the growth of the Microfluidics market is the increasing demand for point-of-care diagnostics and personalized medicine. Microfluidic devices enable rapid and cost-effective analysis of biological samples, allowing for early detection of diseases, monitoring of treatment efficacy, and tailoring of therapies to individual patient needs.

In addition to healthcare applications, microfluidic technologies are transforming the landscape of biomedical research, enabling researchers to conduct experiments with unprecedented precision and scalability. From studying cellular dynamics and microorganisms to exploring complex biological phenomena, microfluidic platforms offer insights that were previously inaccessible using conventional laboratory techniques.

Moreover, the integration of microfluidics with other emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced imaging techniques, is expanding the horizons of biomedical research and diagnostics. By combining microfluidic devices with AI-powered analytics and high-resolution imaging systems, researchers can extract valuable insights from complex biological data with unprecedented speed and accuracy.

Want to learn more? Get Sample PDF Copy

As the Microfluidics market continues to evolve, collaboration between academia, industry, and healthcare providers will be essential to realize its full potential. Addressing challenges such as standardization, scalability, and regulatory compliance will be crucial to accelerating the adoption of microfluidic technologies across diverse applications and settings.

In conclusion, the Microfluidics market represents a paradigm shift in biomedical research and diagnostics, offering a powerful platform for innovation and discovery. With its ability to miniaturize laboratory processes, enhance analytical capabilities, and enable personalized healthcare solutions, microfluidic technology is poised to shape the future of medicine and healthcare delivery, driving advances that benefit patients, researchers, and clinicians alike.

[fakesorbet]

happy pride month :]

[abyssalzones]

hey do my followers know about gills. do you guys know about him

[tapakah0]

WELL YOU KNOW WHAT I'M KISSING YOU REALLY HARD BECAUSE IT WAS IN FACT NOT, AT LEAST ONE OF HIS EYES IS OKAY AND ALL BODY PARTS ALSO

[dailychiprevvington]

day 3.1: forgive me for the harm i have caused this world. none may atone for my actions but me, and only in me shall their stain live on. i am thankful to have been caught, my fall cut short by wizened hands. all i can be is sorry, and that is all i am.

[i-like-swiss-cheese]

the fact that we turned DEADLY NIGHTSHADE into food like 10ish times and didn’t go extinct is fucking crazy, like imagine some Incan dude deciding to plant the one thing around him that kills people every time they eat it until it behaved while 10 other people did the same exact thing, independent of that one guy, and they ALL worked. And now they’re staples of European cuisine bc wheat sucks that badly

[astrrorat]

CHILL SEASON

[ad-astra-per-aspera-1389]

"but donald forced them to eat pellets!" first of all, they seemed to enjoy the pellets while they had them, and guys...they probably continued to eat those pellets long after tasha and leo entered the picture. those bionics (especially adam and bree's) probably burn a lot of calories. their metabolisms are probably super high. the protein pellets were probably engineered specifically to provide enough nutrients and protein for them to grow and function well. yeah, real food is fun and tastes better, but in addition to not shocking their digestive systems, those pellets were probably essential supplements to ensure they were eating enough. and, since donald invented them himself, they're not buying suspicious amounts of food, either. it helps that the kids seem to enjoy them, though (they all cheered when donald brought up protein pellet smoothies in rats on a train)

[lvllabyrinthine]

chirply chip ?

[frnkir]

thinking about how chase’s favorite cookie is sugar-free with chunks of carob, of course it’s so specific 😭🫶

[maeamian]

When I was a young excited physics student I went down to my advisor and asked for a job in a lab. Those of you who are in the sciences may recognize this as exceedingly common, most schools with science departments will hire undergrads for their labs both to give the undergrads experience and to have someone comparatively cheap to do the least skilled labor in those labs.

For me, the lab I was sent to was one doing cool photonics projects and I was assigned to a guy who was doing the theoretical modeling for them and I got put on a side project for them to develop a method to double check their results using Monte Carlo simulations.

Put bluntly, I toiled away in the little cubicle they had me in for about half a year before I transferred to a different school without ever having produced anything of any particular value other than a Monte Carlo simulation whose temperature readings were not taking into account the existence of a heat sink and therefore got overwhelmed by thermal photons in a completely inaccurate and unhelpful way.

Ultimately, many tasks, farmed out like this in a speculative way to undergrads, fail, certainly it's not exceptional that mine did and I learned a lot about the process in the process, so it wasn't wasted time for me, but it produced absolutely nothing the lab could use to further its results.

This is where it turns from a little anecdote about my work history into a morality tale, because what I have thus far deliberately failed to tell you is that the lab I was assigned to is a provider of radar services to the US Military. Had I produced anything of any value whatsoever the work I did would have been used by the US military to help with its capacity to deliver bombs. This is, unfortunately, as those of you who are in the sciences may recognize, also exceedingly common. Luckily, and through no foresight or moral thinking of my own, simply the inexperience of youth, I produced nothing of value but view the path they tried to set me down as a grim warning of what might have been.

I'm not asking for forgiveness, the harm I might have done was not done by me, although I'm also sure was done without my help. They didn't need it to be me they just needed someone with basic calculus knowledge who wouldn't think too hard about the connection between the work and the world, and they were happy enough that particular warm body was me.

So this is my plea, if you're young and getting involved in the sciences because you're passionate about knowledge and understanding our place in the universe. When you go to get that job in that lab that's such a good stepping stone to the next thing you want to do, take a second and look into where that lab's funding is coming from. If it turns out it's the military, maybe then take another second and really deeply consider what kind of thing your work can be used to do and if you would like some of the most bloodthirsty people on the planet to be able to do that thing because of your help.

I got lucky that I didn't help, but I'm hoping that with this warning you might be able to not help on purpose which is a greater moral good than what I managed.

[strxnged]

imagine if i did another songfic event haha. would be so funny. i must be joking because i am a full time student with a part time job and volunteer activities i do not have the capacity to do a songfic event. but imagine haha

[lovingaeth]

i just made a drink so fucking good WOAAAH

[spikes-got-anger-issues]

Instead of remaking Lab Rats, how about we officially reboot Billion Dollar Freshman