A microfluidic device integrated with a stretchable microporous membrane controlled by electro-conjugate fluid

Microfluidic devices that can apply stretch stimulation to cells to mimic the in vivo environment of organs have attracted significant attention as an alternative to animal testing in drug discovery screening. However, those devices reported in previous papers were driven by bulky fluid power systems composed of large external pumps and long tubing systems, which occupy much larger space than the main chip-based device itself and limit the number of simultaneous sample processing. Therefore, it is necessary to mount pressure sources on a single chip for miniaturizing the entire system. In this study, we propose to develop and mount MEMS-fabricated micro -pumps utilizing the strong flow of electro-conjugated fluid (ECF) into the microfluidic devices to stretch a microporous membrane, on which cultured cells can be simulated in various applications. The proposed microfluidic device is successfully fabricated, and its characteristics are investigated experimentally. The experimental results show that the device can stretch the microporous membrane with the strain (5-15%) at a frequency (0.2 Hz) similar to the organs' in vivo environment, demonstrating the feasibility of making the drug discovery screening efficient and effective.