Title: The Microfluidic Lab-on-a-Disc Platform – An Efficient Environment Supporting Rapid Application Development for Decentralised Testing of Biosamples

Biography:

Jens Ducree holds a Full Professorship of Microsystems in the School of Physical Sciences at Dublin City University (DCU), Ireland. He is the founding director of Ireland’s first Fraunhofer Project Centre for Embedded Bioanalytical Systems at DCU (FPC@DCU) – a joint initiative of Science Foundation Ireland and Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft. He is also academic member of the National Centre for Sensor Research (NCSR) and the 3U Joint Institute of Global Health (JIGH), and a principal investigator for Microfluidic Platforms at the Biomedical Diagnostics Institute (BDI) since 2008.

Abstract

The successful commercialisation of microfluidics-enabled solutions in the context of the life sciences is typically led by significant techno-economical challenges on performance, reliability and cost of development and manufacture. With the example of the centrifugal microfluidic “Lab-on-a-Disc” technology, this paper outlines a platform-based approach for expediting and de-risking the route from proof-of-concepts to high technology readiness levels as adopted from mature industries. Rather than starting from scratch, new applications are flexibly configured from a geometrically parametrised design library of Laboratory Unit Operations, e.g. for particle separation, metering and mixing, that are interconnected by flow control elements such as valves for comprehensive sample-to-answer automation of common (bio-)assay protocols, e.g. for small molecules, proteins / antibodies, nucleic acids and bioparticles such as cells. The development kit encompasses experimental and simulation tools to validate functional robustness, guidelines for design and scale-up of manufacture, and standard procedures for system- and component-level characterisation. The modular strategy also offers opportunity towards accelerating regulatory processes and for coordinating industrial supply chains.