title: An automated fluid-transport device for a microfluidic system.
abstract: An automated fluid-transport device for a chip-based capillary electrophoresis system has been developed.  The device mainly consists of six peristaltic micropumps, two vacuum micropumps, microvalves, multi-way joints, titanium tubes, and a macro-to-micro connector.  Various solutions used for the cleaning and activation of chip channels, and electrophoresis separation, are allowed to automatically transport to chip reservoirs by the electric control module.  The performance of the whole system was characterized by the analysis of fluorescein sodium using chip electrophoresis with LED-induced fluorescence detection.  The peak-height variation (RSD) was 3.8% in six cycles of analyses.  Additionally, compared with conventional manual operation, the developed device can spare 60% time for chip pretreatment.  This microdevice offers high-efficiency pretreatment for microchips, thereby resulting in a remarkable improvement of analytical capacity for batch samples.
authors: School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China.
authors: Jun
authors: J
authors: Feng
authors: Xiu-Juan
authors: XJ
authors: Yang
authors: Xin-Chun
authors: XC
authors: Li
authors: Hui
authors: H
authors: Yang
authors: Zuan-Guang
authors: ZG
authors: Chen
mesh_terms: D001331:Automation; D019075:Electrophoresis, Capillary; D019793:Fluorescein / Q000032:analysis; D005453:Fluorescence; D046210:Microfluidic Analytical Techniques / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods
chemical_list: D019793:Fluorescein