Modeling and high performance simulation of electrophoretic techniques in microfluidic chips

Abstract

Electrophoretic separations comprise a group of analytical techniques such as capillary zone electrophoresis, isoelectric focusing, isotachophoresis, and free flow electrophoresis. These techniques have been miniaturized in the last years and now represent one of the most important applications of the lab-on-a-chip technology. A 3D and time-dependent numerical model of electrophoresis on microfluidic devices is presented. The model is based on the set of equations that governs electrical phenomena, fluid dynamics, mass transport, and chemical reactions. The relationship between the buffer characteristics (ionic strength and pH) and surface potential of channel walls is taken into consideration. Numerical calculations were performed by using PETSc-FEM, in a Python environment, employing high performance parallel computing. The method includes a set of last generation preconditioners and solvers, especially addressed to 3D microfluidic problems, which significantly improve the numerical efficiency in comparison with typical commercial software for multiphysics. In this work, after discussing two validation examples, the numerical prototyping of a microfluidic chip for two-dimensional electrophoresis is presented.