Acoustic streaming vortices enable contactless, digital control of droplets

Abstract

Advances in lab-on-a-chip technologies are driven by the pursuit of programmable microscale bioreactors or fluidic processors that mimic electronic functionality, scalability, and convenience. However, few fluidic mechanisms allow for basic logic operations on rewritable fluidic paths due to cross-contamination, which leads to random interference between "fluidic bits" or droplets. Here, we introduce a mechanism that allows for contact-free gating of individual droplets based on the scalable features of acoustic streaming vortices (ASVs). By shifting the hydrodynamic equilibrium positions inside interconnected ASVs with multitonal electrical signals, different functions such as controlling the routing and gating of droplets on rewritable fluidic paths are demonstrated with minimal biochemical cross-contamination. Electrical control of this ASV-based mechanism allows for unidirectional routing and active gating behaviors, which can potentially be scaled to functional fluidic processors that can regulate the flow of droplets in a manner similar to the current in transistor arrays.