(372d) Assessing Particle Selectivity of An Insulator-Based Dielectrophoretic Microdevice

Miniaturization has brought important advantages to separation technologies; such as reduced sample and reagent consumption; higher resolution and sensitivity, low cost and shorter processing time. Dielectrophoresis (DEP) is an extensively employed micro analytical technique with great potential for the manipulation of a wide array of bioparticles. Insulator-based DEP (iDEP) is a dielectrophoretic mode where nonuniform electric fields are created employing insulating structures. In this work, an evaluation of the selectivity of an iDEP microdevice by employing mixtures of polystyrene nano and microparticles is presented. Experimental and mathematical modeling work was carried in order to assess the selectivity of an iDEP glass microdevice to immobilize only the large particles from a binary mixture. The effects of particle concentration, concentration ratio, size ratio, and magnitude of the applied electric potential (200 to 600 V) on the microdevice selectivity were studied. The results demonstrated that high selectivity can be obtained with iDEP.