Miniaturized and IoT Enabled Continuous-Flow-Based Microfluidic PCR Device for DNA Amplification

IEEE Trans Nanobioscience. 2022 Jan;21(1):97-104. doi: 10.1109/TNB.2021.3092292. Epub 2021 Dec 30.

Abstract

Herein, a continuous-flow driven microfluidic device has been designed and fabricated using the CO2 laser ablation method for polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The device consists of a polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) microfluidic channel with 30 serpentine thermal cycles, an arduino board, two custom-made cartridge heaters, and thermocouple sensors. The portable thermal management system, with aluminium blocks placed on a wooden substrate, working on the PID controller principle, is low-cost, battery-powered, automated, integrated, and IoT-enabled. The device with dimensions 80×72×36 mm3 (L × W × H) has a temperature accuracy of ±0.2 °C. The IoT module enables accessing and storage of real-time temperature values directly onto the smartphone through ThingSpeak analytics. It was developed to achieve desirable accurate temperature at two thermal zones, denaturation and annealing (95 °C and 60 °C) on the microfluidic thermal management platform. A PCR mixture of [Formula: see text] was infused into the serpentine-based microchannel using a syringe pump. Amplification of DNA template with 594-base pair (bp) fragment of the rat GAPDH gene was successfully performed on the miniaturized thermal management system. The total time required for a complete PCR reaction was 32 min at an optimum flow rate of [Formula: see text]/min. The amplified sample of the target DNA obtained from the PCR microchannel was then separated by agarose gel electrophoresis and was further analyzed using a gel-doc system. Finally, the obtained results were compared to the conventional PCR instrument showing excellent performance.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • DNA / genetics
  • Lab-On-A-Chip Devices*
  • Microfluidic Analytical Techniques*
  • Microfluidics
  • Polymerase Chain Reaction
  • Rats

Substances

  • DNA