Klapperich Lab:Hot Press Wire Imprinted Microfluidic Chips

Overview

Fabricate wire-imprinted microfluidic chips on the hot press.

Set the temperature of the mechanical hot press to 350°F.
Center a circular arrangement of zeonex beads one layer thick onto one of the metal plates.
Place the metal plate onto the bottom hot press platen.
Carefully align the second plate on top of the first plate without disturbing the collection of zeonex beads.
Hot press the zeonex for 5 minutes at 250 psi.
Remove the metal plates and let them cool enough to be handled.
Peel the zeonex disk off the metal plates.
Set the zeonex disk back onto one of the removable metal plates.
Take 0.38 mm wire cut to a length of 2 cm and arrange four of the wire pieces parallel to each other, staggering them by about 1 cm on the zeonex disk.
Place the metal plate onto the bottom hot press platen.
Carefully align the second plate on top of the first plate without disturbing the arrangement of wire segments.
Reduce the temperature of the hot press to 320°F.
Hot press the zeonex for 2 minutes at 500 psi.
After removing the metal plates, let the plates cool enough to be handled.
Peel the wire imprinted zeonex disk off of the metal plates.
Pop the wire pieces out of the zeonex disk.
Drill, from the grooved side, a hole at each end of an imprinted channel so that the hole overlaps the channel slightly.
Using tweezers, remove any residual plastic from around the drilled hole.

Set the temperature of the hot press to 276°F.
Place an imprinted chip on top of a microfluidic chip base with the grooved side facing the chip base.
Place the stack onto one of the removable metal plates, and set the metal

plate on the bottom platen.

Set the second metal plate on top of the first plate.
Preheat the chip by pumping the handle until the hot press platens meet, but the pressure registers 0 psi for 1 minute.
Bond the base and the imprinted chip by hot pressing for 2 minutes at 550 psi.