A bubble-based microfluidic gas sensor for gas chromatographs

摘要

We report a new proof-of-concept bubble-based gas sensor for a gas chromatography system, which utilizes the unique relationship between the diameters of the produced bubbles with the gas types and mixture ratios as a sensing element. The bubble-based gas sensor consists of gas and liquid channels as well as a nozzle to produce gas bubbles through a micro-structure. It utilizes custom-developed software and an optical camera to statistically analyze the diameters of the produced bubbles in flow. The fabricated gas sensor showed that five types of gases (CO2, He, H-2, N-2, and CH4) produced (1) unique volumes of 0.44, 0.74, 1.03, 1.28, and 1.42 nL (0%, 68%, 134%, 191%, and 223% higher than that of CO2) and (2) characteristic linear expansion coefficients (slope) of 1.38, 2.93, 3.45, 5.06, and 5.44 nL/(kPa (mu L s(-1))(-1)). The gas sensor also demonstrated that (3) different gas mixture ratios of CO2: N2 (100 : 0, 80 : 20, 50 : 50, 20 : 80 and 0 : 100) generated characteristic bubble diameters of 48.95, 77.99, 71.00, 78.53 and 99.50 mu m, resulting in a linear coefficient of 10.26 mu m (mu L s(-1))(-1). It (4) successfully identified an injection (0.01 mu L) of pentane (C-5) into a continuous carrier gas stream of helium (He) by monitoring bubble diameters and creating a chromatogram and demonstrated (5) the output stability within only 5.60% variation in 67 tests over a month.