On-chip trapping of sub-micron objects with surface acoustic wave devices

Master Thesis (2022)
Author(s)

J. Shan (TU Delft - Mechanical Engineering)

Contributor(s)

Sabina Caneva – Mentor (TU Delft - Dynamics of Micro and Nano Systems)

A. Hunt – Mentor (TU Delft - Micro and Nano Engineering)

M.K. Krishna Ghatkesar – Graduation committee member (TU Delft - Micro and Nano Engineering)

S. Iskander-Rizk – Graduation committee member (TU Delft - Optical Technologies)

Faculty
Mechanical Engineering
Copyright
© 2022 Jichao Shan
More Info
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Publication Year
2022
Language
English
Copyright
© 2022 Jichao Shan
Graduation Date
31-08-2022
Awarding Institution
Delft University of Technology
Programme
Mechanical Engineering
Faculty
Mechanical Engineering
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Abstract

Proteins play a key role in many biological processes and are thus useful indicators of health and disease states. Since the size of proteins is few hundred nanometers, it is necessary to explore new techniques to manipulate and 'read' them. This thesis aims to identify and build a platform that enables sub-micron bead manipulation, which will be used to actively deliver the biomolecules attached to the beads to the single-molecule sensor. During this process, accurate positioning, speed control, and multiplexing of the beads need to be solved to give high-resolution and high-throughput sequencing capabilities. We identify surface acoustics wave (SAW) devices as powerful tools to achieve both beads transport and massively parallel manipulation. Our hypothesis is that we can increase the efficiency and precision of bead capture and manipulation by using SAW devices combined with a microcavity layer. In this master thesis, we fabricate the SAW device with an average 2 $\mu m$ thick film, and there are cavity arrays on the film. In addition, we investigate the performance of trapping sub-micron objects during the actuation. Further more, we discuss few challenges found through the experiments and provide possible solutions for them. At last, this thesis is concluded by discussing the work been done and providing suggestions for future experiments.

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