title: The Electroosmotic Flow (EOF).
abstract: Controlling and manipulating liquids and analytes at the sub-millimeter scale is a challenge that frequently requires new methods to be developed. Indeed, scaling-down of traditional macroscopic ideas often fails. For instance, pumping liquids using pressure differences is often impractical and counterproductive because the resulting parabolic flow profile deforms sample zones. As the size of the system shrinks, the surface-to-volume ratio increases and interfacial effects become dominant. This actually opens new possibilities since the phenomenon of electroosmotic flow (EOF), wherein a fluid is made to move relative to a stationary charged boundary, can then be exploited to design efficient microfluidic devices. In this chapter, we review the fundamental principles of EOF as well as some of the methods used to coat channel walls and reduce the impact of EOF in situations where it would be unfavorable for the device performance.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada.
authors.forename: Gary W
authors.initials: GW
authors.lastname: Slater
authors.forename: Frédéric
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Tessier
authors.forename: Katerina
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kopecka
mesh_terms: D000327:Adsorption; D020099:Coated Materials, Biocompatible / Q000737:chemistry; D004563:Electrochemistry / Q000379:methods; D053841:Electroosmosis / Q000379:methods; D019075:Electrophoresis, Capillary / Q000379:methods; D006863:Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; D044085:Microfluidics; D008954:Models, Biological; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry
chemical_list: D020099:Coated Materials, Biocompatible; D011108:Polymers