Coatings and surface treatment 28% Nature Communications
Using silicone oil creates a slippery surface that can reduce frictional drag by this amount – up to 50 times greater than the team anticipated.
microfluidic channel, the risk was that the high pressure needed to push the flow through the device would damage the sample. Because the method developed by the Sydney team reduces the frictional drag, there is no longer a need to apply such high levels of pressure. Another advantage, says Neto, arises in cases where the microfluidic device requires protein adhesion on the test sample, but not anywhere else.
A compelling reason to change? So, does Neto think that her team’s discovery will change the way microfluidic devices are manufactured? She agrees that the principle could be adopted but adds that for mass manufacture it would be necessary to use different fabrications, as the ones used by her team were “lab scale” and couldn’t be used commercially.
She is also cautious, pointing out that microfluidic devices are built with traditional materials and that it’s not that easy to get people to change the materials from which they fabricate those devices. There would, she adds, have to be a “very compelling reason to do it” and she thinks the most likely will be a biological study that requires gentle pressure to be applied to the flow, and therefore needs a liquid wall to replace the solid one. In a medical microfluidic device, in which a minute volume of liquid reacts
with the solid surface of the channel, she says it is “important that you control how that flows, because you don’t want to lose your samples on the walls”. Neto’s principal interest is less in the commercial application of her discovery than the science itself: “It’s more the fundamental understanding that has been really rewarding, being able to fully understand what’s happening in this complex system.” She has, however, considered the ways in which the findings could have implications elsewhere, pointing out, for example, that oil is sometimes extracted from rock by pushing water through it. If the walls of the rock are covered in nanobubbles, that would decrease the effectiveness of the removal. Similarly, she says, there is evidence that having gas dissolved in oil or water can destabilise an emulsion: “Emulsions are everywhere, from paint to the food industry to pharmaceuticals.” Ignoring the presence of the gas could lead to errors in modelling these systems. Yet it’s clear the discovery has major implications for anyone interested in how microfluidic devices could be used in medicine. Until now the problem of frictional drag – along with the cost of mass production – has held back widespread adoption. Solving that particular problem could be an important step on the path to turning the long-held dream of a universally available lab-on-a-chip into a reality. ●
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