Abstract

Synthesis and Assembly Biomimetic Heterogeneous Microcomponents on an Electro-Microfluidic Platform

Shih Kang Fan, Professor, National Taiwan University

Synthesis and assembly of multi-functional, heterogeneous, and encoded microcomponents, or building blocks, are essential to engineering hierarchical, complex, and three-dimensional structures. The elaborately organized architectures devise metamaterials that hold new physical properties unusual in nature or artificial tissues that reappear physiological functions by imitating natural and biological arrangements. Here we demonstrate synthesis and assembly of microcomponents by electrowetting-on-dielectric (EWOD) and dielectrophoresis (DEP) on a robotic electro-microfluidic platform. The platform is capable of (1) driving different droplets of hydrogel prepolymers before cross-linking, (2) arranging particles or cells in the droplets, and (3) forming microcomponents by cross-linking droplets in different shapes. In the presentation, we will demonstrate the synthesis and assembly of different hydrogel microcomponents containing different dyes and particles. The heterogeneous structures with cell adhesive GelMA (gelatin methacrylate) and non-adhesive PEG-DA (Poly(ethylene glycol) diacrylate) surfaces are prepared for cell culture. The culture of fibroblasts NIH/3T3, neonatal mouse cardiomyocyte, and endothelia HUVEC on the engineered structures synthesized and assembled on the robotic electro-microfluidic platform will be reported.