Reconfigurable Magnetic Liquid Metal Robot for High-Performance Droplet Manipulation.

Journal: Nano letters
PMID: 35333539

Abstract

Droplet manipulation is crucial for diverse applications ranging from bioassay to medical diagnosis. Current magnetic-field-driven manipulation strategies are mainly based on fixed or partially tunable structures, which limits their flexibility and versatility. Here, a reconfigurable magnetic liquid metal robot (MLMR) is proposed to address these challenges. Diverse droplet manipulation behaviors including steady transport, oscillatory transport, and release can be achieved by the MLMR, and their underlying physical mechanisms are revealed. Moreover, benefiting from the magnetic-field-induced active deformability and temperature-induced phase transition characteristics, its droplet-loading capacity and shape-locking/unlocking switching can be flexibly adjusted. Because of the fluidity-based adaptive deformability, MLMR can manipulate droplets in challenging confined environments. Significantly, MLMR can accomplish cooperative manipulation of multiple droplets efficiently through on-demand self-splitting and merging. The high-performance droplet manipulation using the reconfigurable and multifunctional MLMR unfolds new potential in microfluidics, biochemistry, and other interdisciplinary fields.

Authors

  • Yuxuan Zhang
    School of Electrical Engineering, Yanshan University, 438 Hebei Avenue, Qinhuangdao 066004, China. Electronic address: 1535937433@qq.com.
  • Shaojun Jiang
    CAS Key Laboratory of Mechanical Behavior and Design of Materials, Key Laboratory of Precision Scientific Instrumentation of Anhui Higher Education Institutes, Department of Precision Machinery and Precision Instrumentation, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China.
  • Yanlei Hu
    Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Key Laboratory of Precision Scientific Instrumentation of Anhui Higher Education Institutes, CAS Key Laboratory of Mechanical Behavior and Design of Materials, Department of Precision Machinery and Precision Instrumentation, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China.
  • Tao Wu
    Xinjiang Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi, Xinjiang, 830011, China.
  • Yiyuan Zhang
    Department of Joint Surgery, the Second Hospital of Fuzhou, Teaching Hospital of Xiamen University, Fuzhou Fujian, 350001, P.R.China.972133982@qq.com.
  • Huizeng Li
    Key Laboratory of Green Printing, Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
  • An Li
    Maryland Applied Graduate Department of Robotics Engineering, Maryland Robotics Center, A. James Clark School College of Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, United States.
  • Yachao Zhang
    CAS Key Laboratory of Mechanical Behavior and Design of Materials, Key Laboratory of Precision Scientific Instrumentation of Anhui Higher Education Institutes, Department of Precision Machinery and Precision Instrumentation, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China.
  • Hao Wu
    Zhejiang Institute of Tianjin University (Shaoxing), Shaoxing, China.
  • Yinlong Ding
    CAS Key Laboratory of Mechanical Behavior and Design of Materials, Key Laboratory of Precision Scientific Instrumentation of Anhui Higher Education Institutes, Department of Precision Machinery and Precision Instrumentation, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China.
  • Erqiang Li
    Department of Modern Mechanics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China.
  • Jiawen Li
    Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing, The University of Adelaide Adelaide SA Australia.
  • Dong Wu
  • Yanlin Song
    State Key Laboratory of Biotherapy and Cancer Center, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610041, PR China.
  • Jiaru Chu
    Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Key Laboratory of Precision Scientific Instrumentation of Anhui Higher Education Institutes, CAS Key Laboratory of Mechanical Behavior and Design of Materials, Department of Precision Machinery and Precision Instrumentation, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China.

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