PDMS, bonding irreversible sealing

The channels in the PDMS replica are sealed by bonding a flat piece of PDMS following surface oxidization in air plasma. The oxidized PDMS surfaces bond when brought into conformal contact forming an irreversible... 

The surfaces of the channel side of the cured PDMS and a clean glass cover slide (No. 1) are treated with plasma for 20 s and bonded together to form an irreversible seal. 

The second method involves plasma treatment of the surface. For example, when two plasma oxidized PDMS surfaces are brought into conformal contact, an irreversible seal forms between them. This technique can be used to bond two PDMS layers [15,16]. Oxygen plasma treatment of PDMS also enables the bonding of PDMS to other materials such as glass [17]. Plasma oxidation of a PDMS surface makes it more hydrophilic from its native hydrophobic state [15,16]. 

The PDMS channel slab should be bonded to a cover substrate in order to create a sealed chip. This can be achieved by irreversible bonding after oxidation of the PDMS layer to create the silanol groups [170,960,1033,1043]. The PDMS surfaces can be oxidized in an 02 plasma [1033],Telsa coil [171,172], RIE system... 

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