System on biochips: A new design for integration of multiple DMFBs

Abstract

Digital microfluidic biochips have emerged in last decade as one of the major alternative platforms for employing conventional laboratory methods for biochemical and biomedical applications. On completion of the Bioassay protocols in DMFBs the detection is enabled at the scheduled optical detection sites within the chip area itself. Based on the detection results obtained from a series of tests in a single biochip - it may prompt to perform next sequence of tests in order to converge towards specific disease pattern and diagnosis. In this paper we have proposed a design of a centralized control system coupled with a droplet detection analyzer. The detection analyzer analyzes the combination of results for a series of test and feeds the result to a centralized controller that logically determines the next series of tests to be conducted on another biochip based on a intelligent database stored in the integrated memory of the system. The simulation is carried out on a series of tests for homogeneous samples in different biochips integrated together through the proposed central system controller and the detection results obtained from multiple DMFBs are displayed. © 2012 IEEE.