Fractal-shaped microchannel design for a kinetic analysis of biochemical reaction in a delay line

• Published in: Microfluidics and nanofluidics Vol. 13; no. 2; pp. 273 - 278
• Main Authors: Hirata, Katsuki, Ichii, Tetsuo, Suzuki, Hiroaki, Matsuura, Tomoaki, Hosoda, Kazufumi, Yomo, Tetsuya
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer-Verlag 01.09.2012; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Analytical Chemistry; Applied fluid mechanics; Biochemistry; Biological and medical sciences; Biomedical Engineering and Bioengineering; Bioreactors; Biotechnology; Channels; Design engineering; Dynamics; Engineering; Engineering Fluid Dynamics; Exact sciences and technology; Fluid dynamics; Fluidics; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Fundamental areas of phenomenology (including applications); Methods. Procedures. Technologies; Microfluidics; Nanostructure; Nanotechnology and Microengineering; Physics; Reaction kinetics; Reaction time; Research Paper; Various methods and equipments; Water-in-oil emulsion; Fractal; Biochemical reaction; Droplet microfluidics; Water oil emulsion; Fractal system; Experimental study; Design; Bioreactors; Microchannel; Droplets; Microstructure; Microfluidics
• ISSN: 1613-4982; 1613-4990
• DOI: 10.1007/s10404-012-0958-y

Microfluidic systems have been widely used to investigate chemical and biochemical reactions in a small volume. Their geometries are designed to meet the time scale and detection scheme for specific reactions to be analyzed. However, the time scales of the reaction dynamics depend on the type of reactions and concentrations of reactants, and the required time resolution also varies even in a single reaction time course. A system design that is universally applicable to a wide range of time scales should save time and reduce costs. Here, we propose a microfluidic channel design in a fractal-shaped configuration for a kinetic analysis of biochemical reactions encapsulated in microdroplets. We demonstrate that this configuration is effective in resolving the time courses of β -glucuronidase-catalyzed hydrolysis reactions and in vitro translation/transcription reactions, which are different in their reaction time scales, by simply changing the levels of the target nodes in the fractal geometry.