Micromachines, Volume 12, Issue 3

This study presents a dielectrophoresis-based liquid metal (LM) droplet control microfluidic device. Six square liquid metal electrodes are fabricated beneath an LM droplet manipulation pool. By applying different voltages on the different electrodes...

This paper reports a mechanism understanding how to reduce the solder joint failure phenomenon in the laser spot micro-welding process of ultra-thin steel sheets. An optimization method to improve solder joint service life is proposed. In this study,...

A capillary interaction between floating objects and adjacent walls, which is known as “Cheerios effect”, is a common phenomenon that generates capillary attraction or repulsion forces between them depending on their wettabilities, densities, geometr...

As the microporous structure has been widely used in the field of precision machining, at the same time, the requirements for the quality of microporous machining are continuously increasing. Water jet-guide laser processing technology (WJGL) has bee...

In robotic micromanipulation systems, the orthogonality of the three-axis motion trajectories of the motion control systems influences the accuracy of micromanipulation. A method of measuring and evaluating the orthogonality of three-axis motion traj...

High-throughput microflow cytometry has become a focal point of research in recent years. In particular, droplet microflow cytometry (DMFC) enables the analysis of cells reacting to different stimuli in chemical isolation due to each droplet acting a...

Microfluidics is an essential technique used in the development of in vitro models for mimicking complex biological systems. The microchip with microfluidic flows offers the precise control of the microenvironment where the cells can grow and structu...

Immiscible liquid–liquid flows in microchannels are used extensively in various chemical and biological lab-on-a-chip systems when it is very important to predict the expected flow pattern for a variety of fluids and channel geometries. Commonly, bio...

The use of rapid point-of-care (PoC) diagnostics in conjunction with physiological signal monitoring has seen tremendous progress in their availability and uptake, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). However, to truly overcome i...

An effective strategy for improving the charge transport efficiency of p-type Cu₂O photocathodes is the use of counter n-type semiconductors with a proper band alignment, preferably using Al-doped ZnO (AZO). Atomic layer deposition (ALD)-prepared AZO...

In recent years, additive manufacturing has steadily gained attention in both research and industry. Applications range from prototyping to small-scale production, with 3D printing offering reduced logistics overheads, better design flexibility and e...

The use of whole blood and some biological specimens, such as urine, saliva, and seminal fluid are limited in clinical laboratory analysis due to the interference of proteins with other small molecules in the matrix and blood cells with optical detec...

Based on the graphene floating gate, a tunable terahertz metamaterial absorber is proposed. Compared with the traditional graphene–dielectric–metal absorber, our absorber has the property of being non-volatile and capacity for anti-interference. Usin...

To prevent electron leakage in deep ultraviolet (UV) AlGaN light-emitting diodes (LEDs), Al-rich p-type Al_xGa_(1−x)N electron blocking layer (EBL) has been utilized. However, the conventional EBL can mitigate the electron overflow only up to some exte...

Compared with a traditional optical system, the single-lens curved compound eye imaging system has superior optical performance, such as a large field of view (FOV), small size, and high portability. However, defocus and low resolution hinder the fur...

Despite significant advances in numerous fields of biofabrication, clinical application of biomaterials combined with bioactive molecules and/or cells largely remains a promise in an individualized patient settings. Three-dimensional (3D) printing an...

In cancer research and drug screening, multicellular tumor spheroids (MCTSs) are a popular model to bridge the gap between in vitro and in vivo. However, the current techniques to culture mixed co-culture MCTSs do not mimic the structural architectur...

Under several circumstances, a nanowire transistor with a square cross-section behaves as a circular. Taking the Gate-All-Around junctionless transistor as a primary example, we investigate the transition of the conductive region from square to circl...

An axial flux permanent magnet single-rotor generator has good potential in various applications that require high efficiency, prolonged service life, as well as low mass and dimensions. However, the effect of cogging torque diminishes generator effi...

Wireless body area network (WBAN) applications have broad utility in monitoring patient health and transmitting the data wirelessly. WBAN can greatly benefit from wearable antennas. Wearable antennas provide comfort and continuity of the monitoring o...

Overhang provides a simple but effective way of coupling (sub)structures, which has been widely adopted in the applications of optomechanics, electromechanics, mass sensing resonators, etc. Despite its simplicity, an overhanging structure demonstrate...

A water droplet dispensed on a superhydrophobic ratchet surface is formed into an asymmetric shape, which creates a Laplace pressure gradient due to the contact angle difference between two sides. This work presents a magnetically actuated superhydro...

In the field of underwater emergency maintenance, submarine pipeline cutting is generally performed by a diamond wire saw. The process, in essence, involves diamond grits distributed on the surface of the beads cutting X56 pipeline steel bit by bit a...

In this study, we analyzed the threshold voltage shift characteristics of bottom-gate amorphous indium-gallium-zinc-oxide (IGZO) thin-film transistors (TFTs) under a wide range of positive stress voltages. We investigated four mechanisms: electron tr...

For improving retention characteristics in the NOR flash array, aluminum oxide (Al₂O₃, alumina) is utilized and incorporated as a tunneling layer. The proposed tunneling layers consist of SiO₂/Al₂O₃/SiO₂, which take advantage of higher permittivity a...

In blood flow studies, image analysis plays an extremely important role to examine raw data obtained by high-speed video microscopy systems. This work shows different ways to process the images which contain various blood phenomena happening in micro...

The tiny magnetic steel pair (TMSP), composed by two tiny magnetic steel blocks (TMSBs), is critical for some precision instruments. Incorrect matching of TMSP may result in insufficient instrument performance. Herein, the matching method of TMSP bas...

A fiber optic whispering gallery mode (WGM) resonator was proposed and realized by integrating an inline polymer waveguide with a microsphere mounted on it. The polymer waveguide with a diameter of 1 μm was printed with femtosecond laser-assisted mul...

Microfluidic devices offer the potential to automate a wide variety of chemical and biological operations that are applicable for diagnostic and therapeutic operations with higher efficiency as well as higher repeatability and reproducibility. Polyme...

We present experimental studies of alternating current (AC) electrowetting dominantly influenced by several unique characteristics of an ion gel dielectric in its capacitance. At a high-frequency region above 1 kHz, the droplet undergoes the contact...

As coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) continues to spread around the world, the establishment of decentralized severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) diagnostics and point-of-care testing is invaluable. While polymerase chain r...

Phenolic compounds contain classes of flavonoids and non-flavonoids, which occur naturally as secondary metabolites in plants. These compounds, when consumed in food substances, improve human health because of their antioxidant properties against oxi...

Unlike tactile displays that use mechanical actuators, electrode-type tactile displays can be easily integrated and miniaturized because they consist of electrodes and insulators. Electrical tactile displays only require electrodes and use an electri...

A multi-function microelectromechanical system (MEMS) with a three-axis magnetometer (MAG) and three-axis accelerometer (ACC) function was implemented with an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC)-compatible complementary metal-oxide-semicon...

This paper presents modeling and parameter identification of the Duhem model to describe the hysteresis in the Piezoelectric actuated nano-stage. First, the parameter identification problem of the Duhem model is modeled into an optimization problem....

This paper presents a new design of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) based low-g accelerometer utilizing mode-localization effect in the three degree-of-freedom (3-DoF) weakly coupled MEMS resonators. Two sets of the 3-DoF mechanically coupled r...

Rapid tooling technology (RTT) provides an alternative approach to quickly provide wax injection molds for the required products since it can reduce the time to market compared with conventional machining approaches. Removing conformal cooling channe...

In this work, a mechanical model of a rope-driven piezoelectric vibration energy harvester (PVEH) for low-frequency and wideband energy harvesting was presented. The rope-driven PVEH consisting of one low-frequency driving beam (LFDB) and one high-fr...

The quick growth of information technology has necessitated the need for developing novel electronic devices capable of performing novel neuromorphic computations with low power consumption and a high degree of accuracy. In order to achieve this goal...

Antibiotics can accumulate through food metabolism in the human body which may have a significant effect on human safety and health. It is therefore highly beneficial to establish easy and sensitive approaches for rapid assessment of antibiotic amoun...

An electrothermal microgripper is an important actuator in microelectromechanical and micro-operating systems, and its temperature field analysis is the core problem in research and design. Because of the small size of an electrothermal microgripper,...

Intervertebral fusion surgery for spinal trauma, degeneration, and deformity correction is a major vertebral reconstruction operation. For most cages, the stiffness of the cage is high enough to cause stress concentration, leading to a stress shieldi...

Nowadays, surface acoustic wave (SAW) resonators are attracting growing attention, owing to their widespread applications in various engineering fields, such as electronic, telecommunication, automotive, chemical, and biomedical engineering. A thorou...

Background: 3D bioprinting is the future of constructing functional organs. Creating a bioactive scaffold with pancreatic islets presents many challenges. The aim of this paper is to assess how the 3D bioprinting process affects islet viability. Meth...

PolyJet™ 3D printers have been widely used for the fabrication of microfluidic molds to replicate castable resins due to the ease to create microstructures with smooth surfaces. However, the microstructures fabricated by PolyJet printers do not accur...

Optical vortex (OV) beams are widely used for the generation of light fields with transverse energy flow inducing orbital motion of the nano- and microparticles in the transverse plane. Here, we present some new modifications of OV beams with autofoc...

This paper studies the forces acting upon the Intraosseous Transcutaneous Amputation Prosthesis, ITAP, that has been designed for use in a quarter amputated femur. To design in a failure feature, utilising a safety notch, which would stop excessive s...

A magnetic field measurement system based on an array of Hall sensors is proposed. The sensors are fabricated using conventional microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) techniques and consist of a P-type silicon substrate, a silicon dioxide isolation l...

Donor–acceptor-type organic semiconductor molecules are of great interest for potential organic field-effect transistor applications with ambipolar characteristics and non-volatile memory applications. Here, we synthesized an organic semiconductor, P...

The complexity of the phenomena simultaneously occurring, from the very first instants of high-power laser pulse interaction with the target up to the phase explosion, along with the strong changes in chemical-physical properties of matter, makes mod...