Micromachines, Volume 11, Issue 3

C-reactive protein (CRP) is considered to be an important biomarker associated with many diseases. During any physiological inflammation, the level of CRP reaches its peak at 48 h, whereas its half-life is around 19 h. Hence, the detection of low-lev...

The ability to manipulate and control active microparticles is essential for designing microrobots for applications. This paper describes the use of electric and magnetic fields to control the direction and speed of induced-charge electrophoresis (IC...

When using foil queue microelectrodes (FQ-microelectrodes) for micro electrical discharge machining (micro-EDM), the processed results of each foil microelectrode (F-microelectrode) can be stacked to construct three-dimensional (3D) microstructures....

A global design method for a terahertz monolithic integrated frequency multiplier is proposed. Compared with a traditional independent design, the method in this paper adopts overall optimization and combines the device with the circuit design. The a...

Single-crystal quartz material is widely applied in the manufacture of resonators and sensors, but it is difficult to process because of its high hardness. A novel way to fabricate single-crystal quartz structures is proposed in this paper; the metho...

The miniaturized and integrated microlens array (MLA) can effectively achieve the beam homogenization, compactness and miniaturization of laser systems. When the high-coherence laser beam is homogenized by means of using the MLA, interference fringes...

Important accomplishments concerning an integrated laser source based on stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) have been achieved in the last two decades in the fields of photonics, microphotonics and nanophotonics. In 2005, the first integrated silicon...

Optical aspheric components are inevitably affected by various disturbances during their precision machining, which reduces the actual machining accuracy and affects the optical performance of components. In this paper, based on the theory of multi-b...

Microfluidic system, as a kind of miniature integrated operating platform, has been applied to solid-state nanopore sensors after many years of experimental study. In the process of introducing microfluidic into solid-state nanopore sensors, many nov...

In this study, a 3D coil embedded in a silicon substrate including densely distributed through-silicon vias (TSVs) was fabricated via a rapid metal powder sintering process. The filling and sintering methods for microdevices were evaluated, and the e...

A simple and inexpensive method using planar electrodes was proposed for the measurement of the imaginary part of the Clausius-Mossotti factor, ${\mathrm{K}}_{\mathrm{i}}$ , of particle/cell for electrorotation (ER) and travelling wave dielectrophoresis (twDEP). It...

We report on a one-step method for cutting 250-µm-thick quartz plates using highly focused ultrashort laser pulses with a duration of 200 fs and a wavelength of 1030 nm. We show that the repetition rate, the scan speed, the pulse overlap and th...

This article reports on the locomotion performance of a miniature robot that features 3D-printed rigid legs driven by linear traveling waves (TWs). The robot structure was a millimeter-sized rectangular glass plate with two piezoelectric patches atta...

Hydrodynamic-based microfluidic platforms enable single-cell arraying and analysis over time. Despite the advantages of established microfluidic systems, long-term analysis and proliferation of cells selected in such devices require off-chip recovery...

Miniaturized heat exchangers are well known for their superior heat transfer capabilities in comparison to macro-scale devices. While in standard microchannel systems the improved performance is provided by miniaturized distances and very small hydra...

Under certain conditions, electrophoretic deposition (EPD) of single-wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) onto metal at the base of nanoscale insulating windows can result in a single SWCNT per window, bonded at one end to the metal. During EPD charge, bui...

In this paper, we present the design, simulation, fabrication and characterization of a microfluidic relative permittivity sensor in which the fluid flows through an interdigitated electrode structure. Sensor fabrication is based on an silicon on ins...

In the past few decades, silicon photonics has witnessed a ramp-up of investment in both research and industry. As a basic building block, silicon waveguide crossing is inevitable for dense silicon photonic integrated circuits and efficient crossing...

Being able to precisely characterize the mechanical properties of soft microparticles is essential for numerous situations, from the understanding of the flow of biological fluids to the development of soft micro-robots. Here, we present a simple mea...

Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations are conducted to determine energy and momentum accommodation coefficients at the interface between rarefied gas and solid walls. The MD simulation setup consists of two parallel walls, and of inert gas confined bet...

This paper presents a novel fabrication process that allows integration of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)-based microfluidic channels and metal electrodes on a wafer with a micrometer-range alignment accuracy. This high level of alignment accuracy enabl...

In this paper, a simple fabrication process for SU-8 in-plane micro electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) structures, called “border-bulk micromachining”, is introduced. It aims to enhance the potential of SU-8 MEMS structures for application...

In this study, a novel magnetorheological (MR) polishing device under a compound magnetic field is designed to achieve microlevel polishing of the titanium tubes. The polishing process is realized by combining the rotation motion of the tube and the...

The investigation of clandestine laboratories poses serious hazards for first responders, emergency services, investigators and the surrounding public due to the risk of exposure to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) used in the manufacture of illicit...

The superhydrophobic surface has a great advantage of self-cleaning, inhibiting bacterial adhesion, and enhancing anticoagulant properties in the field of biomedical materials. In this paper, a superhydrophobic surface was successfully prepared on ti...

Hydrodynamic cavitation has been widely applied in micro-fluidic systems. Cavitating flow characteristics are closely related to the fluid properties. In this paper, the cavitation characteristics of Cu nano-fluid in micro-channels were numerically i...

Tungsten trioxide (WO₃) is a wide band gap semiconductor material, which is commonly not only used, but also investigated as a significant electrochromic layer in electrochromic devices. WO₃ films have been prepared by inorganic and sol-gel free ammo...

Giant magnetostrictive actuators (GMA) are widely used in the field of servo valves, but the displacement of GMA is limited, which renders meeting the requirements of large flow direct-drive electro-hydraulic servo valves (DDV) difficult. In order to...

The traditional driving waveform of the electrowetting display (EWD) has many disadvantages, such as the large oscillation of the target grayscale aperture ratio and a long time for achieving grayscale. Therefore, a driving waveform based on the expo...

When screening microbial populations or consortia for interesting cells, their selective retrieval for further study can be of great interest. To this end, traditional fluorescence activated cell sorting (FACS) and optical tweezers (OT) enabled metho...

A ZnO seed layer was formed on the fluorine-doped tin oxide substrate by magnetron sputtering, and then a ZnO nanorod was grown on the ZnO seed layer by a hydrothermal method. Next, we prepared a single-crystal Ag seed layer by magnetron sputtering t...

In this study, a novel finishing method, entitled clustered magnetorheological finish (CMRF), was proposed to improve surface finish of the silicon nitride ( ${\mathrm{Si}}_3{\mathrm{N}}_4$ ) balls with ultra fine precision. The effects of different polishing p...

We believe a point-of-care (PoC) device for the rapid detection of the 2019 novel Coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) is crucial and urgently needed. With this perspective, we give suggestions regarding a potential candidate for the rapid detection of the coron...

A microfluidic co-culture system, consisting of mouse embryonic stem cells (mESCs)/OP9 cells, was evaluated as a platform for studying hematopoietic differentiation mechanisms in vitro. mESC differentiation into blood cells was achieved in a microcha...

This paper deals with a multiphysics numerical modelling via finite element method (FEM) of an air-coupled array piezoelectric micromachined ultrasonic transducers (PMUTs). The proposed numerical model is fully 3D with the following features: the pre...

Nonlinear frequency generation requires high intensity density which is usually achieved with pulsed laser sources, anomalous dispersion, high nonlinear coefficients or long interaction lengths. Whispering gallery mode microresonators (WGMRs) are pho...

Modulations of fluid flow inside the bone intramedullary cavity has been found to stimulate bone cellular activities and augment bone growth. However, study on the efficacy of the fluid modulation has been limited to external syringe pumps connected...

Zinc oxide (ZnO) micro and nanorods were successfully prepared using Pandanus amaryllifolius and hexamethylenetetramine (HMTA) separately as stabilizers using the solution immersion method. Two types of ZnO seed layer were prepared using the same pre...

Zone plates are diffractive optics commonly used in X-ray microscopes. Here, we present a wet-chemical approach for fabricating high aspect ratio Pd/Si zone plate optics aimed at the hard X-ray regime. A Si zone plate mold is fabricated via metal-ass...

The growing interest in magnetic materials as a universal tool has been shown by an increasing number of scientific publications regarding magnetic materials and its various applications. Substantial progress has been recently made on the synthesis o...

The concept of merging pre-processed textile materials with tailored mechanical properties into soft matrices is so far rarely used in the field of soft robotics. The herein presented work takes the advantages of textile materials in elastomer matric...

We present a numerical model for the recently introduced simple and inexpensive micromachined aluminum devices with a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) cover for microparticle acoustophoresis. We validate the model experimentally for a basic design, where...

Optical projection tomography (OPT) is the direct optical equivalent of X-ray computed tomography (CT). To obtain a larger depth of field, traditional OPT usually decreases the numerical aperture (NA) of the objective lens to decrease the resolution...

In this study, we developed a modified glassy carbon electrode (GCE) with graphene oxide, multi-walled carbon nanotube hybrid nanocomposite in chitosan (GCE/GO-MWCNT-CHT) to achieve simultaneous detection of four nucleobases (i.e., guanine (G), adeni...

Microinjection is an established and reliable method to deliver transgenic constructs and other reagents to specific locations in C. elegans worms. Specifically, microinjection of a desired DNA construct into the distal gonad is the most widely used...

High aspect ratio microstructures (HARMS) are of great importance for many application fields. Many defects are generated during the fabrication processes, especially in line microstructures, and it is necessary to examine the quality of the structur...

Microfluidic systems have been widely explored based on microfluidic technology, and it has been widely used for biomedical screening. The key parts are the fabrication of the base scaffold, the construction of the matrix environment in the 3D system...

Microfluidic chips—in which chemical or biological fluid samples are mixed into linear or nonlinear concentration distribution profiles—have generated enormous enthusiasm of their ability to develop patterns for drug release and their pot...

The aim of the study is to develop a compact, robust and maintenance free gas concentration and humidity monitoring system for industrial use in the field of inert process gases. Our multiparameter gas-monitoring system prototype allows the simultane...

Liposomes and giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) in particular are excellent compartments for constructing artificial cells. Traditionally, their use requires bench-top vesicle growth, followed by experimentation under a microscope. Such steps are tim...