The History of Microfluidics
Microfluidics, the revolutionary technology behind emerging body-on-a-chip and organs-on-chips systems is poised to transform the way drug discovery and safety testing have been traditionally done. But what exactly is microfluidics? How do these complex devices, used to monitor tissue-tissue interactions, at the micro-physiological level actually work? So in this blog, let’s delve a little bit deeper into the history of microfluidic technology and its projected meteoric rise.
By definition, microfluidics is the science of analyzing or processing the flow of liquids through microscopic channels, from 1 to 1000 microns in diameter. To put it in perspective, a single strand of hair is just about 100 microns wide! Nowadays, almost no product development in the life sciences or diagnostics takes place, which does not in one form or another other involves elements with microfluidic functionality. Hidden in plain sight, microfluidics underlies a variety of devices that are essential to our lives, from inkjet printers to glucometers for the monitoring of diabetes. In fact, this same technology that shoots droplets of ink on paper in inkjet printers also enables 3D printers to dispense layers of polymers. Its roots can be traced to 19th-century discoveries in the behavior of fluid jets.
The history of microfluidics is related to multiple disciplines that have contributed to its rise and development by lending their methods and materials before microfluidics, itself became a standalone science. The field of microfluidics has four parents: molecular analysis, biodefence, molecular biology, and microelectronics. Where microanalytic methods — gas-phase chromatography, high-pressure liquid chromatography, and capillary electrophoresis — made it possible to simultaneously achieve high sensitivity and high resolution using small amounts of sample, a second different motivation for the development of microfluidic systems came with the realization of the major military and terrorist threats posed by chemical and biological weapons after the end of the cold war.
To counter these threats, a series of programs aimed at developing field-deployed microfluidic systems to detect these threats were supported by defense agencies. These programs were the main stimulus for the rapid growth of academic microfluidic technology. The explosion of genomics in 1980, along with the advent of other areas of micro-analysis introduced the approaches of microfluidics in the field of molecular biology. These approaches provided analytical methods with much greater throughput, higher sensitivity, and resolution. Its origins can also be traced back to microelectronics where micro-fabrication techniques such as photolithography have shown to be very successful in microelectronic devices.
Microfluidics has often been heralded as a game changer in life sciences research and industry. In the near future, there are going to be more microfluidic applications, making possible more precise analysis of various molecules, like DNA, proteins, and bacteria, or analysis at the scale of a single cell. The continuing development of organ-on-a-chip technology will lead to faster and better drug developments and cheaper diagnostic products which will bring benefits to developing countries. The explosive rise of microfluidics has just begun and we, at ResearchSat, are taking it to Space!
