I-Corps: Takig Microfluidic Design, Fabrication, and Test to the Classroom Bench

通过美国国家科学基金会创新团队学习计划（I-Corps L），该项目将开发方法来扩大项目的规模和影响，将廉价的动手微制造实验室引入高中科学课程。尽管微型和纳米组件在手机、电脑和家用电器等商业产品中的应用急剧和持续增长，但美国市场在产生相关微型/纳米制造工作岗位方面的进展比其他国家缓慢。在大学和研究中心蓬勃发展的微纳米制造通常不会转化为本科或高中课程的变化。因此，学生们倾向于将他们对世界的看法局限于理论而不是实验/应用的观点。这个项目将创建教育路线，将微加工技术引入高中。这项工作还将使高中教师能够制作随时可用的微纳米教育材料。通过该计划的实施，微流体装置的设计、制造和测试可以在传统的教室中进行，使用台式材料和工具，每个学生每次实验的最低成本约为一美元。在这个项目的中心，基于磁带的制造方法使学生能够设计、构建和测试他们自己的微流体设计。该技术简单、廉价，易于实现。此外，该项目将通过提供廉价和现成的教育材料，帮助减少高中教师面临的实际障碍。这些材料将通过与高中课程直接相关的实验（因此它们很容易与课程相结合）以及实验过程的视频，幻灯片，活动前和活动后的问题（因此很容易复制实验）促进教师采用该技术。这个I-Corps L中的技术对高中教育者有价值，因为它提供了一种廉价、容易获得和安全的方式来向学生介绍微流体。通过让学生参与这一过程，他们将获得对创新可能性的欣赏，对实验设计过程充满信心，并开始理解朝着科学目标努力的重要性。

Through the NSF Innovation Corps for Learning Program (I-Corps L), this project will develop ways to increase the scale and impact of a program that brings inexpensive hands-on microfabrication laboratories into high school science courses. Despite the dramatic and sustained increase of applications of micro- and nano-components in commercial products such as cell phones, computers, and home appliances, the US market progresses more slowly than others towards generating the associated increase in micro-/nano-manufacturing jobs. The micro- and nano-fabrication that thrives in universities and research centers oftentimes does not translate into curriculum changes at the undergraduate or high school levels. As a result, students tend to limit their view of the world to theoretical rather than experimental/applied perspectives. This project will creating educational routes to take microfabrication into high school. This work will also enable high school teachers to produce ready-to-use micro- and nano-educational materials. Through the implementation of this program, the design, fabrication, and testing of microfluidic devices can be carried out in conventional lecture rooms using benchtop materials and tools at a minimal cost of about one dollar per student per experiment.The tape-based fabrication method at the center of this project makes it possible for students to design, build, and test their own microfluidic designs. The technique is simple and inexpensive, and easy to implement. Additionally, this project will help to reduce the practical barrier faced by high school teachers by offering inexpensive and ready-to-use educational materials. Such materials will facilitate the adoption of the technique by teachers by means of experiments that relate directly to the high school curriculum (so they are easy to integrate with the courses) as well as videos of the experimental procedure, slides, pre- and post-activity questions (so that it is easy to replicate the experiments). The technology in this I-Corps L has value to high school educators in that it offers an inexpensive, accessible, and safe way to introduce microfluidics to students. By exposing students to this process, they will gain an appreciation for the possibilities of innovation, become confident in the experimental design process, and begin to understand the importance of working toward a scientific goal.