Bio-Microfluidics Real-Time Monitoring Using CNN Technology

A new non-invasive real-time system for the monitoring and control of microfluidodynamic phenomena involving transport of particles and two phase fluids is proposed. The general purpose design of such system is suitable for in vitro and in vivo experimental setup and, therefore, for microfluidic applications in the biomedical field, such as lab-on-chip and for research studies in the field of microcirculation. The system consists of an ad hoc optical setup for image magnification providing images suitable for acquisition and processing. The main feature of the optical system is the accessibility of the information at any point of the optical path. It was designed and developed using discrete opto-mechanic components mounted on a breadboard. The optical sensing, acquisition, and processing were all performed using an integrated vision system based on cellular nonlinear networks (CNNs) analogic (analog plus logic) technology called focal plane processor (FPP, Eye-RIS, Anafocus) that was inserted in the optical path. Ad hoc algorithms were implemented for the real-time analysis and extraction of fluidodynamic parameters in micro-channels. They were firstly tested on sequences of images recorded during in vivo microcirculation experiments on hamsters and then applied on images acquired and processed in real-time during in vitro experiments on two-phase fluid flow in a continuous microfluidic device (serpentine mixer, ThinXXS).