"Plug-n-Play" Sensing with Digital Microfluidics

Digital microfluidics (DMF) is a platform that enables highly reconfigurable and automated fluidic operations using a generic device architecture. A unique hallmark of DMF is its "flexibility": a generic device design can be used and reused for many different, divergent fluidic operations. The flexibility of DMF is compromised when devices are permanently modified with embedded sensors. Here we introduce a solution to the "flexibility gap" between fluidic operations in digital microfluidics and embedded sensors: "plug-n-play DMF" (PnP-DMF). In PnP-DMF, devices are designed to allow for rapid and seamless exchange of sensors depending on the application needs. This paper provides "proof of concept" for PnP-DMF using commercial biosensors for glucose and beta-ketone, a custom paper-based electrochemical sensor for lactate, and a generic screen-printed electroanalytical cell. We demonstrate that hot-swapping sensors between experiments allows for convenient implementation of complex processes such as automated analysis of blood samples by standard addition. Finally, we explored the suitability for using PnP sensors in tandem with other sensing modalities, combining biosensor-based electrochemical measurement of glucose with a chemiluminescent magnetic bead-based sandwich immunoassay for insulin. The latter is notable, as it constitutes the first report of an analysis of different analytes in both the supernatant and precipitate from a single sample-aliquot in a microfluidic device. The results presented here highlight the versatility of PnP-DMF, illustrating how it may be useful for a wide range of applications in diagnostics and beyond.