Towards portable flow cytometry: study on the use of air-sheath-based volume-efficient two-phase microfluidic systems

Reports experimental studies on air-liquid two-phase stratified flows in polymeric microfluidic channels for volume-efficient and cost-effective flow cytometry. Different flow behaviors of liquid core streams sheathed by air flows were investigated by varying surface chemistry and geometry of poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) channels. Fluorescent beads and myoblast cells carried by stable liquid flows were analyzed by a digital photo-multiplier tube (PMT)-based optical detection system to analyze the number of particles in a sample.