An electrodynamic preconcentrator integrated thermoelectric biosensor chip for continuous monitoring of biochemical process

This paper proposes an integrated sensor chip for continuous monitoring of a biochemical process. It is composed of a preconcentrator and a thermoelectric biosensor. In the preconcentrator, the concentration of the injected biochemical sample is electrodynamically condensed. Then, in the downstream thermoelectric biosensor, the preconcentrated target molecules react with sequentially injected capture molecules and generate reaction heat. The reaction heat is detected based on the thermoelectric effect, and an integrated split-flow microchannel improves the sensor stability by providing ability to self-compensate thermal noise. These sequential preconcentration and detection processes are performed in completely label-free and continuous conditions and consequently enhance the sensor sensitivity. The performance of the integrated biosensor chip was evaluated at various flow rates and applied voltages. First, in order to verify characteristics of the fabricated preconcentrator, 10 m -diameter polystyrene (PS) particles were used. The particles were concentrated by applying ac voltage from 0 to 16 V_pp at 3 MHz at various flow rates. In the experimental result, approximately 92.8% of concentration efficiency was achieved at a voltage over 16 V_pp and at a flow rate below 100 l h^-1. The downstream thermoelectric biosensor was characterized by measuring reaction heat of biotin-streptavidin interaction. The preconcentrated streptavidin-coated PS particles flow into the reaction chamber and react with titrated biotin. The measured output voltage was 288.2 V at a flow rate of 100 l h^-1 without preconcentration. However, by using proposed preconcentrator, an output voltage of 812.3 V was achieved with a 16 V_pp-applied preconcentration in the same given sample and flow rate. According to these results, the proposed label-free biomolecular preconcentration and detection technique can be applied in continuous and high-throughput biochemical applications.