Photopyroelectric microfluidics

Abstract

Precision manipulation of various liquids is essential in many fields. Unlike solid objects, fluids are intrinsically divisible, enriching their fundamental operations with merging, dispensing, and splitting on top of moving. Fluids are sticky as well, calling for their lossless manipulation to prevent mass loss and contamination. We present photopyroelectric microfluidics that meet all the requirements. In response to the irradiation from even one single beam of light, our platform creates a unique wavy dielectrophoretic force field that is remarkably capable of performing desired loss-free (loss being 0.5% of existing one) manipulation of droplets of surface tension from 18.9 to 98.0 mN m−1 and volume from 1 nl to 1000 μl, functioning as a “magic” wetting-proof hand to navigate, fuse, pinch, and cleave fluids on demand, enabling cargo carriers with droplet wheels and upgrading the limit of maximum concentration of deliverable protein by 4000-fold.