Tween 20 is frequently added to particle suspensions for reducing the particle–wall adhesion and particle–particle aggregation in microfluidic devices. However, the influences of Tween 20 on the fluid and particle behaviors have been largely ignored. We present in this work the first experimental study of the effects of Tween 20 addition on the electrokinetic transport of fluids and particles in a polydimethylsiloxane microchannel. We find that adding 0.1% v/v Tween 20 to a buffer solution can significantly reduce the electroosmotic mobility as well as the electrokinetic and electrophoretic mobilities of polystyrene particles and yeast cells. Further increasing the Tween 20 concentration within the range typically used in microfluidic applications continues reducing these mobility values, but at a smaller rate. Our finding suggests that Tween 20 should be used with care in electrokinetic microdevices when the flow rate or particle/cell throughput is an important parameter.

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Tween 20 添加对聚二甲基硅氧烷微通道中动电传输的影响

Tween 20 经常添加到颗粒悬浮液中，以减少微流体装置中的颗粒-壁粘附和颗粒-颗粒聚集。然而，Tween 20 对流体和颗粒行为的影响在很大程度上被忽略了。我们在这项工作中首次提出了添加 Tween 20 对聚二甲基硅氧烷微通道中流体和颗粒动电传输影响的实验研究。我们发现，在缓冲溶液中添加 0.1% v/v Tween 20 可以显着降低聚苯乙烯颗粒和酵母细胞的电渗迁移率以及电动和电泳迁移率。在微流体应用通常使用的范围内进一步增加 Tween 20 浓度会继续降低这些迁移率值，但速率较小。我们的研究结果表明，当流速或颗粒/细胞吞吐量是一个重要参数时，在动电微型设备中应谨慎使用 Tween 20。