Study of low noise high throughput microchip device for electrochemical measurement from single cells

Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on May 16, 2013).The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file.Dissertation advisor: Dr. Kevin GillisIncludes bibliographical references.Vita.Ph. D. University of Missouri--Columbia 2012."May 2012"We are developing transparent multi- electrochemical electrode arrays on microchips in order to automate measurement of quantal exocytosis of oxidizable transmitter from individual vesicles. In order to achieve low noise recording, I measured the current noise power spectral density (SI) to understand the physical basis of dominant noise sources. My results demonstrate that microchip electrodes have a noise performance that is comparable, and in some cases superior, to that of “gold standard” carbon-fiber microelectrodes. Whereas patterning hundreds of electrodes in a small area is straightforward using photolithography, easily making connections between hundreds of electrodes and external amplifiers remains a bottleneck. Here I report a multiplexing approach using multiple fluidic compartments that can reduce the number of external connections by ~100-fold. Measurements demonstrate that it attains current noise levels as low as that obtained with individual electrodes. The new device will enable high-throughput measurements combined with fluorescence microscopy.Includes bibliographical reference