A MICROFABRICATED DEVICE AND METHOD FOR MULTIPLEXED ELECTROKINETIC FOCUSING OF FLUID STREAMS AND A TRANSPORT CYTOMETRY METHOD USING SAME

摘要

One embodiment of the present invention provides amicrochip (10) adapted for the simultaneous spatial confinementof electrokinetically driven fluidic material streams on themicrochip. The microchip includes a focusing chamber (22) formedin the surface of the microchip and in fluid communication withtwo sample channels (28, 30) and three focusing channels (32, 40,42). The embodiment further includes electromotive meansoperatively connected to the sources of the sample fluids (14, 18) andthe sources of focusing fluid (12, 16, 20) for electrokineticallydriving the respective streams of the sample and focusingfluids such that the focusing fluid streams spatially confine the firstand second sample streams within the focusing chamber.Another embodiment of the present invention provides a cytometrymethod for analyzing microscopic particles in a fluid medium ona microchip by utilizing the focusing function of the microchip.In this process the width of the fluid stream is narrowed in thefocusing chamber.