Development of novel chemical sensing systems based on microfluidic devices

Abstract

A recent microfabrication technology opened the new application field such as micro total analysis systems (Micro TAS) or microreactors. These systems employed physical characteristics provided by the liquid microspace, involving short diffusion distance, large surface to volume ratio, or small heat capacity. In contrast to these works, we focused on the chemical functions of highly-selective molecular recognition molecules or functional dyes of which we have been developed, to be integrated into microfluidic chemical sensing systems. The present paper describes our recent results concerning chemical sensing systems based on microfluidic devices. Here, a multi ion sensing system based on the intermittent reagent pumping and ion-pair extraction, a new biosensing scheme based on the enzyme-immobilized polymer membrane, and a novel multi ion sensing scheme based on capillary-assembled microchip, are presented. © 2005 The Japan Society for Analytical Chemistry.