Rapid concentration of particle and bioparticle suspension based on surface acoustic wave

A method of rapid particle concentration in a droplet has been developed using surface acoustic wave (SAW) technology. A droplet was partially placed on a surface acoustic wave propagation path, and particles were concentrated at the center of the droplet due to the asymmetry. The device consists of two IDTs and two reflectors. The one IDT is used for generating SAW and the opposite IDT is used for detecting output voltage signal amplitude, and then for calculating acoustic power density of a droplet. To investigate concentration effect of the device, starch suspension and rabbit blood cells were used in this paper. Different acoustic power density was applied ranging from 6.13 mw mm−2 to 210.9 mw mm−2. The concentration process occurs within 15 s under appropriate acoustic power density put on the droplet, which is much faster than currently available particle concentration mechanisms, and the method is also efficient, which concentrating the particles into an aggregate about one-fifth the size of the original droplet. Additional, the concentration process is no damage to bioparticles. This concentration method can improve greatly SAW biosensor system sensitivity.