Supporting Technology With Challenging Requirements

Medical & Life Sciences ManifoldsCarville have been supplying bonded fluidic manifolds to the medical sector for use in haematology, next generation sequencing, clinical chemistry and many other In Vitro Diagnostic (IVD) applications for over 30 years.

 

Today, companies operating in the Medical, Life Science and Pharmaceutical Industries require products and technology that are becoming  increasingly challenging to manufacture. Medical manifolds are one of those products.  Clients within the medical & life science sectors are now requiring medical manifolds manufactured with:

• Reduced track sizes
• More complex internal features and details
• Accurate alignment of internal and external features
• Better performance with more aggressive fluids and chemicals
• High level of repeatability
• Lower costs

 

To support these evolving and challenging requirements, Carville is constantly developing innovative manufacturing processes and techniques. One of these developments has resulted in a unique and proprietary manufacturing technique called High Accuracy Diffusion Bonding (HADB).

 

The Benefits of HADB

micro_fluidic_devices_02

HADB is a proprietary process, developed by Carville with the support of leading names in the European and North American medical sectors. The drivers behind HADB were:

Higher Accuracy
With the reduction in track sizes, far less reagent and much smaller samples sizes are required, offering cost benefits to both the testing facility and the end user.
Smaller tracks require higher accuracy and improved alignment to avoid internal dead volumes and the risk of sample hang-up. The HADB process offers a more accurate manifold with track features down to 150uM width and 100uM depth.

Low Material Stress
PMMA (acrylic) has been used for medical manifolds since the 1980’s. While acrylic is a low cost, transparent and relatively inert material, acrylic carrying internal manufacturing stresses can be attacked by both reagents and cleaning materials.

The HADB process delivers manifolds which are much lower in stress, and when tested against other medical grade PMMA manifolds were found to contain up to 80% less material stress. This low stress offers better resistance to internal chemistry attack ensuring improved reliability and a longer product life.

Alternative materials
When PMMA is fundamentally not up to the job in terms or temperature requirements or more aggressive chemistries, Carville offer customers HADB fluidic manifolds produced in PolyEtherimide (Ultem – PEI) which can tackle most applications. This is an extremely resistive material which can operate at high heat levels (170 degrees C) but does have the disadvantage of being higher cost and not fully transparent.

Lower Costs
The development of improved testing techniques along with the requirement for preventative screening has resulted in a growing market for lower cost, single use, disposable components and devices. The Carville HADB process is a proven and viable option for customers looking to achieve a high range and diversity of specification targets.