The Additive Manufacturing Approach to Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) Microfluidic Devices: Review and Future Directions

Overview

Journal Polymers (Basel)

Publisher MDPI

Date 2023 Apr 28

PMID 37112073

Authors

Anthony Tony

Ildiko Badea

Chun Yang

Yuyi Liu

Garth Wells

Kemin Wang

Ruixue Yin

Hongbo Zhang

Wenjun Zhang

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

This paper presents a comprehensive review of the literature for fabricating PDMS microfluidic devices by employing additive manufacturing (AM) processes. AM processes for PDMS microfluidic devices are first classified into (i) the direct printing approach and (ii) the indirect printing approach. The scope of the review covers both approaches, though the focus is on the printed mold approach, which is a kind of the so-called replica mold approach or soft lithography approach. This approach is, in essence, casting PDMS materials with the mold which is printed. The paper also includes our on-going effort on the printed mold approach. The main contribution of this paper is the identification of knowledge gaps and elaboration of future work toward closing the knowledge gaps in fabrication of PDMS microfluidic devices. The second contribution is the development of a novel classification of AM processes from design thinking. There is also a contribution in clarifying confusion in the literature regarding the soft lithography technique; this classification has provided a consistent ontology in the sub-field of the fabrication of microfluidic devices involving AM processes.

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