Intellectual property ownership is a key consideration for organisations contemplating embedding microfluidic technologies in their products and services. This page points to early public domain sources and expired patents describing key microfluidic techniques. Are you aware of earlier key materials? Please e-mail us if you want to contribute to this collection!
Our thanks to contributors: Friedrich Menges, Lily Kim, Holger Becker, Henk Stapert, Frank Craig, Alexios Tzannis
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Measurement of Activity of Single Molecules of O-D-Galactosidase * — Boris Rotman, Stanford 1961 Description of chemical reactions in and between droplets
Simple Microfluidics—Cemal Eringen Pergamon Press 1964 ?First? use of the term Microfluidics. Theory of mass, heat transfer and flow in small channels
Integrated Microconduits for Flow Injection Analysis— Analytica Acta 161 1984 ?First? description and diagrams showing channels engraved in a microfluidic device
U.S. Patent 4,533,254A; 4,908,154A. (Filed 1984) Granted patent now lapsed. Apparatus for forming
Miniaturized Total Chemical Analysis System: a Novel Concept for Chemical Sensing (purchase required) —Manz, Graber, Widmer 1990 ?First? use of the term uTAS, description of key processes in small channels/tubes
Micromachining of monocrystalline silicon and glass for chemical analysis systems A look into next century’s technology or just a fashionable craze? – A. Manz*, , J.C. Fettinger, E. Verpoorte, H. Lüdi, H.M. Widmerand D.J. Harrison Trends in Analytical Chemistry 1991
Capillary Electrophoresis and Sample Injection Systems integrated on a Planar Glass Chip —Harrison, Manz, Ludi, Widmer and Fan. Trends in Analytical Chemistry 1992
Proceedings of the 1st uTAS Conference (1994) published by Kluwer Academic Publishers, ISBN 0-7923-3217-2
?First? Mention of DNA Testing Device 1995 and 1997
U.S. Patent 5,846,727. (Filed 1997, Granted) Microsystem for rapid DNA sequencing. Steven A. Sopor, Jack D. Davies and Yuli Vladimirsky. First mention of soft lithography
Biosensors and Microfluidic Systems Hesketh et Al 1998
Broad (Still live!) MF Patents held by Caliper Life Sciences (building on the work of Michael Ramsey at Oak Ridge) eg U.S. Patent 5842787 (Filed 1997) claiming channel with aspect ratio <1 U.S. Patent 6,010,607 U.S. Patent 6,010,608 (Filed: September 1998) U.S. Patent 6,001,229 U.S. Patent 5,858,195 (Filed: August 1995)
5842787 (1997) from Caliper, which claims a channel with aspect ratio <1 is much talked about
Microfluidic Manifolds by Hot Embossing for uTAS applications—Becker et Al 1998
Quantitative Analysis of Molecular Interaction in a Microfluidic Channel: The T-Sensor— Kamholz et Al 1999 ?First? Mention of the T-Sensor
Analysis of Patent Literature Classifications: Clinical Chemistry 2002 48 Analytical Microchips (Fabrication, Integration, Plastic Microchips, Simulation and Modelling) Microfluidics (General, Mixing, Valves, Pumps) Applications (Amplification/PCR, Chromatography, DNA Analysis, Electrophoresis, Immunoassay Mass spectroscopy, protein analysis
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