Inkjet printing of functional structures for lab-on-chip systems

Inkjet printing is a versatile manufacturing technique that can be used to deposit solutions or suspensions of functional materials onto different substrates. In this paper, potential applications of inkjet printed structures in microfluidic lab-on-chip devices are presented. All inkjet-printed electroactive polymer actuators on polymer substrates are discussed that can in principle be used to fabricate membrane pumps for direct integration into microfluidic lab-on-chip devices. Bending beams as test structures show deflections of more than 100µm. A concept of a membrane pump with a printed EAP actuator is described. Futhermore first results on inkjet printed resistive heating elements and temperature sensors are presented. By combining pumping an temperature control functions onto one chip, basic components of an inkjet printed lab-on-chip device become feasible