Full Wafer Fabrication Process for Microfluidic Glass Chips with Electroplated Electrodes

A full wafer fabrication process is presented for fabrication of microfluidic chips with integrated electroplated electrodes. The process is based on structured dry film resist on glass. The photoresist is bonded to a second glass substrate using heat and pressure. The chemical stability of the resist allows electroplating of electrodes after structuring the microfluidic network. At the same time it serves as an electroplating mask. The method gives full design flexibility to the user, is very fast and extremely simple. The process is used for creating electrophoretic chips with an integrated sacrificial silver-chloride electrode for bubble-free actuation.