MODELLING AND HIGH PERFORMANCE SIMULATION OF ELECTROPHORETIC TECHNIQUES IN MICROFLUIDIC CHIPS

KLER, PABLO A.; CLAUDIO L.A. BERLI; FABIO A. GUARNIERI

MICROFLUIDICS AND NANOFLUIDICS

SPRINGER HEIDELBERG

Año: 2010 vol. 10 p. 187 - 198

1613-4982

Abstract Electrophoretic separations comprise a group of analytical techniques such as capillary zone electrophoresis, isoelectric  focusing, isotachophoresis and free flow electrophoresis. These techniques have been miniaturized in the last years and now  represent one of the most important applications of the lab-on- a-chip technology. A 3D and timedependent numerical model of electrophoresis on microfluidic devices is presented. The model is based on the set of equations that governs electrical phenomena, fluid dynamics, mass transport and chemical reactions. The relationship between the buffer characteristics (ionic strength, pH) and surface potential of channel walls is taken into consideration.  Numerical calculations were performed by using PETSc-FEM, in a  Python environment, employing high performance parallel  computing. The method includes a set of last generation  preconditioners and solvers, especially addressed to 3D microfluidic problems, which significantly improve the numerical  efficiency in comparison with typical commercial software for multiphysics. In this work, after discussing two validation  examples, the numerical prototyping of a microfluidic chip for  two-dimensional electrophoresis is presented.