CAREER: Ionic-Type Phononic Metamaterials: Physics and Acousto-Fluidic Applications

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Cardiovascular diseases are the leading causes of death and disability in the western world and are a great burden to modern society; an estimated 17.5 million people every year die from them. A number of recent studies have shown that the levels of circulating endothelial progenitor cells in blood stream is good predictor of the heart disease risk. However, current methods to detect these rare circulating cells are only suitable for well-equipped research laboratories. There remains an unmet medical need for development of point-of-care biomedical technologies allowing rapid and reliable quantification of endothelial progenitor cells directly from patient's blood. This research program proposes to develop novel microfluidic technologies based on phononic (acoustic) metamaterials (artificial materials) for high- efficiency size-based enrichment, affinity-base isolation and label-free counting of endothelial progenitor cells from blood samples. To achieve these goals, the proposed research program aims to make a remarkable leap in understanding and use of acoustic forces created on piezoelectric substrates. Similar to electronics, it aims to introduce a complete set of acoustic-microfluidic components that can be combined to provide full laboratory functions on a chip platform. In addition to providing training opportunities for graduate students, the educational component of this program incorporates unrepresented minorities from undergraduate programs such as Multicultural Engineering Program and offers mentored summer research experiences (internships) to local high school students. Furthermore, the proposed program aims to contribute in outreach activities through programs such as Girls in Engineering Program, a program focused on middle school girls and to provide senior design project opportunities to final year undergraduate students.This research program aims to introduce novel acousto-microfluidic devices with new functionalities using on phononic bandgap structures. It focuses particularly on ionic-type phononic metamaterials offering a monolithic integration capability to piezoelectric substrates. This opens door to planar and scalable integration of phononic bandgap structures with microfluidics and acoustic wave sources. Merging phononic bandstructure engineering and microfluidics at a fundamental level could lead to modular lab-on-chip technologies that can be programmed to do different tasks in a compact and highly efficient way. The specific goals of this program are (1) to advance of our understanding of two-dimensional phononic metamaterials to guide, trap and focus acoustic phonons, (2) to merge these two-dimensional phononic metamaterials with microfluidics, and (3) to demonstrate practical uses of these novel acousto- microfluidic devices for sorting, isolation and counting of endothelial progenitor cells for detection of hearth diseases. The proposed research program involves theoretical analysis of monolithic phononic metamaterials, acoustic radiation forces and dynamic behavior of micro- bioparticles in acousto-microfluidic channels. The designed phononic metamaterial devices will be fabricated using in-house fabrication facilities and the powerful fabrication techniques recently developed in Yanik lab. Acousto-microfluidic experiments will be conducted to test, refine and advance theoretical models of these metamaterials and understanding of acoustic radiation forces in solution environment. Yanik lab will also demonstrate practical uses of phononic bandgap devices for size/affinity-based sorting, manipulation and isolation of micro- bioparticles in microfluidic channels for biomedical applications. The intellectual merit of the proposed research lies in the fundamental knowledge of ways to manipulate surface acoustic waves by phononic metamaterials to optimize their use in microfluidic systems. Understanding advantages and technical issues associated with employing phononic metamaterials will lead to a deeper insight into their unprecedented potential for more involved schemes of acoustofluidic particle manipulation. This will be accomplished by interdisciplinary research combining our expertise from physics, electrical engineering and biological sciences.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.