SBIR Phase I: Disposable pL Fluid Transfer/Microarray Printing Device

这个小企业创新研究第一阶段项目提出开发一种一次性聚合物基微阵列打印设备，其成本仅为当前最先进设备的一小部分，同时在可靠性和性能方面提供显着改进。尽管广泛用于DNA和蛋白质微阵列的微接触印刷，但用于阵列制造的手工制造的尖锐金属针在购买成本和持续维护和清洁方面仍然非常昂贵。聚合物销将使用硅微加工和电铸的组合来制造，以制备非常高精度的正微模具，这将是生产控制流体流向打印头所需的精细特征所必需的。拟议中的塑料针的商业应用将广泛应用于使用印刷微阵列的生物研究活动。该产品的一些优点将包括更好的润湿性，平行制造，非常精确的尺寸，形成更小和更均匀的斑点的能力，一次性使用，以及低于金属销当前成本的0.5%的可用性。

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I Project proposes to develop a disposable polymer based microarray printing device that will cost a small fraction of the current state of the art devices and at the same time offer significant improvements in reliability and performance. In spite of wide spread use for microcontact printing of DNA and protein microarrays, the manually manufactured, sharpened metal pins used for array fabrication remain very expensive both in terms of purchase cost and constant maintenance and cleaning. Polymer pins will be manufactured using a combination of silicon micromachining and electroforming to prepare a very high precision positive micromold, which will be needed to produce the fine features necessary to control fluid flow to the printing tip. The commercial application of the proposed plastic pins will be on a broad range of biological research activities that use printed microarrays. Some of the advantages of the product will include better wettability, parallel manufacturing, very precise dimensions, capability to form smaller and more uniform spots, disposable, and availability at less than 0.5% of the current cost of metal pins.