Self-assembled microtubular electrodes for on-chip low-voltage electrophoretic manipulation of charged particles and macromolecules

Apratim Khandelwal; Nagendra Athreya; Michael Q Tu; Lukas L Janavicius; Zhendong Yang; Olgica Milenkovic; Jean-Pierre Leburton; Charles M Schroeder; Xiuling Li

doi:10.1038/s41378-022-00354-6

Self-assembled microtubular electrodes for on-chip low-voltage electrophoretic manipulation of charged particles and macromolecules

Microsyst Nanoeng. 2022 Feb 28:8:27. doi: 10.1038/s41378-022-00354-6. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Apratim Khandelwal^{1

2}, Nagendra Athreya^{1

2}, Michael Q Tu^{3

4}, Lukas L Janavicius^{1

2}, Zhendong Yang⁵, Olgica Milenkovic^{1

6}, Jean-Pierre Leburton^{1

2}, Charles M Schroeder^{3

4}, Xiuling Li^{1

2

4

5}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA.
² Nick Holonyak Micro and Nanotechnology Laboratory, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA.
³ Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA.
⁴ Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA.
⁵ Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Microelectronics Research Center, University of Texas, Austin, TX 78758 USA.
⁶ Coordinated Science Laboratory, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA.

Abstract

On-chip manipulation of charged particles using electrophoresis or electroosmosis is widely used for many applications, including optofluidic sensing, bioanalysis and macromolecular data storage. We hereby demonstrate a technique for the capture, localization, and release of charged particles and DNA molecules in an aqueous solution using tubular structures enabled by a strain-induced self-rolled-up nanomembrane (S-RuM) platform. Cuffed-in 3D electrodes that are embedded in cylindrical S-RuM structures and biased by a constant DC voltage are used to provide a uniform electrical field inside the microtubular devices. Efficient charged-particle manipulation is achieved at a bias voltage of <2-4 V, which is ~3 orders of magnitude lower than the required potential in traditional DC electrophoretic devices. Furthermore, Poisson-Boltzmann multiphysics simulation validates the feasibility and advantage of our microtubular charge manipulation devices over planar and other 3D variations of microfluidic devices. This work lays the foundation for on-chip DNA manipulation for data storage applications.

Keywords: Electrical and electronic engineering; Materials science; Microfluidics.