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Project

Establishing Microfluidic Spatial Multidimensional Technology to Revolutionize the Post-genomic Discovery of Immunotherapeutic Strategies Enabling Novel Drug Development (FWOTM955)

Modern column-based liquid chromatography (LC) is the dominant technique in the area of separation sciences to analyze complex mixtures. To increase the separation performance, multidimensional approaches have been developed. However, for contemporary life- sciences samples, characterized with a large dynamic range and complex sample matrix, current state-of-the-art technologies have inadequate resolving power and are too time consuming. This project aims at realizing the revolutionary concept of microfluidic spatial multidimensional LC, to establish a landmark technological breakthrough in the field of chromatography with respect to separation power and speed. In spatial three-dimensional LC, separations will be performed by migrating analytes to three directions of a microfabricated chip device. High-resolution 3D- printing technology will be developed to accomplish rapid prototyping of a chip device with an intricate channel design consisting of >1,000 parallel channels. A novel concept based on active rotating flow control will be integrated on-chip and combined with pressure- and electro-driven elution modes. Functionalized polymer monolithic nanomaterials will be synthesized in-situ in the microchannels to yield smart combinations of orthogonal chromatographic modes. Ultimately, a unique microchip interface is proposed allowing hyphenation to mass-spectrometry detection to accomplish a proof-of-principle spatial 3D-LC separation in the field of immunotherapeutics.
Date:1 Oct 2019 →  1 Jun 2022
Keywords:microfluidics, liquid chromatography, immunotherapy
Disciplines:Separation technologies