This paper describes the design, fabrication, and testing of a microfluidic sensor for dielectric spectroscopy (DS) of human whole blood during coagulation. The sensor, termed ClotChip, employs a three-dimensional (3D), parallel-plate, capacitive sensing structure with a floating electrode integrated into a microfluidic channel. Interfaced with an impedance analyzer, the ClotChip measures the complex relative dielectric permittivity, εr, of human whole blood in a frequency range of 40Hz to 100MHz. The temporal variation in the real part of the blood dielectric permittivity at 1MHz features a time to reach a permittivity peak, Tpeak, as well as a maximum change in permittivity after the peak, Δεr,max, as two distinct parameters of ClotChip readout. The ClotChip performance was benchmarked against rotational thromboelastometry (ROTEM) to evaluate the clinical utility of its readout parameters in capturing the clotting dynamics arising from coagulation factors and platelet activity. Tpeak exhibited a very strong positive correlation (r = 0.99, p < 0.0001) with the ROTEM clotting time (CT) parameter, whereas Δεr,max exhibited a strong positive correlation (r = 0.85, p < 0.001) with the ROTEM maximum clot firmness (MCF) parameter. This work demonstrates the ClotChip potential as a point-of-care (POC) platform to assess the complete hemostatic process using <10μL of human whole blood.
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