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Microfluidic applications have evolved and benefitted from several innovations throughout the years. New designs have expanded use from simple microanalysis performed in the lab to the rapidly growing area of Point of Care (POC) diagnostics. With these advances, the choice of materials used to fabricate biochips, cartridges, and other microfluidic components also continues to evolve.
COC Emerges as Top Alternative
Glass and polymers like silicone were the mainstays for many years. However, other polymers are increasingly being used in these applications due to their useful properties and lower cost. Materials commonly used include polycarbonate (PC), polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA), and polystyrene (PS). More recently, cyclic olefin copolymer (COC) has emerged as a microfluidic material, offering high optical clarity, low water absorption, exceptional moisture barrier, and excellent resistance to chemicals, including leading organic solvents used in chemical analysis. These properties have made COC a top choice in microfluidics applications.
Overall, COC is used in various applications, including packaging, medical devices, optical lenses, drug delivery, and microfluidics. The material’s unique properties make it an excellent material for the design and manufacture of microfluidic parts used in analytical systems, research, and biomedical devices. COC can be used to replicate features including microchannels with fabrication processes such as hot embossing for low to medium throughput, and injection molding for faster production of high-quantity detailed parts.
This article will discuss how the properties of COC provide superior performance which is critical in designing sophisticated microfluidic devices and how advances in areas such as 3D printing technologies have expanded design possibilities while significantly decreasing the time necessary to produce a working prototype.
Major Differentiator is Superior Performance
COC is a copolymer consisting of ethylene and 2-norbornene, a cyclic olefin. Glass transition temperature of these amorphous copolymer grades is determined by the percentage of norbornene used. Products with glass transitions from 78°C to 178°C are available along with grades for applications requiring high heat such as steam sterilized items and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) devices.
In terms of optical performance, COC materials provide excellent transmission in the visible range, with some grades offering added UV transmission below 300nm which is useful in applications such as DNA analytics. COC exhibits one of the lowest levels of autofluorescence among available polymers - a critical property...