Membrane chips lithography for microfluidic hydrogel-based microstructures

Abstract

Here, the authors demonstrate a method called "Membrane Chips Lithography (MCL)" to form photopolymerized hydrogel-based microarchitectures that utilize polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) - based microstructures and oxygen inhibition layers. The hydrogel microstructures differ from other microstructures exposed by the transparency mask whereas focusing on designed membrane chips. Base on the thin PDMS-based membrane, it has these advantages about less UV light intensity attenuation and few refractive exposure errors. The special oxygen inhibition layers between different kind of hydrogel microstructures exposed by the UV light and PDMS walls could be applied to the biotechnology such as cell biology, tissue engineering, drug development, and clinical medicine.