Multiplexing microarrays with OSTEmer-biosticker : From polymer fabrication to bio analysis

Abstract: Microarray technology provides powerful tools in the field of biomedicalresearch because it can measure molecular interactions in a highly parallelfashion. It has uses in protein, DNA or cell research, in both discovery anddiagnostic applications. Microfluidics, on the other hand, provides thenecessary tools to rapidly transport and mix small volumes of sample to amicro-sensor area. Bridging these two technologies has the potential todevelop a miniaturized, automated and ease-of-use toolbox for biologicalanalysis. However, the integration of microfluidics with microarrays is notstraightforward, as if a robust and leak-tight seal between the microarray andthe microfluidic channels. Current sealing methods are either impractical,such as mechanical clamping, or not compatible with proteins, such as heat orplasma bonding or gluing. Moreover the former methods create a permanentseal that, once applied prevents the microfluidic structure to be removed later.This work focuses on developing a microfluidic add-ons ("Biosticker") that canbe robustly sealed with protein microarrays with maintained biologicalactivity, but at the same time easily removed to allow for multiple stickersapplied in a sequence or scanning of the microarray in a standard reader. Thefeatures of the novel Biostickers are made possible by the use ofOff-stoichiometry thiol-ene-epoxy (OSTEmer) polymers. In this thesis, wedesign and fabricate Biostickers for rapid integration with pre-spottedmicroarrays and experimentally verify how these micropatterned Biostickerscan be used to significantly facilitate multiplexed assays, by avoiding the useof beads.