Design and fabrication of a micromachined Coulter counter

Abstract

This paper reports the design and fabrication of a micromachined Coulter counter. Calculations have been performed to estimate the behaviour of the counter for passing particles. A relative resistance change of 1.8% has been derived for a particle of 1.5 µm radius flowing through a capillary of 5 µm side length and an electrode spacing of 40 µm. The fabrication technology has been based on similar micromachining steps to a micromixer, and allows further design modification to generate other microfluidic devices. Thus, integration of other microfluidic devices is possible with this technology. The fabrication relies on silicon trench etching and subsequent deposition of metal electrodes over the trench edges. Finally, a Pyrex wafer is anodically bonded on top of the silicon to seal the capillaries.