Résumé: Digital microfluidic biochips (DMFBs) have fueled a paradigm shift in implementing bench-top laboratory experiments on a single tiny chip, thus replacing costly and bulky equipment. However, because of imprecise fluidic functions, several volumetric split-errors may occur during the execution of bioassays. Earlier approaches to error-correcting sample preparation addressed this problem by using a cyberphysical system yielding several drawbacks such as increased sample-preparation cost and time, the need for sensing devices, and uncertainty in assay-completion time. Besides, error-correction for only a single target-sample has been considered so far, although many assays require the production of multi-target samples. In this work, we present an error-free dilution technique that guarantees the correctness of the resulting concentration factor of a sample without performing any additional roll-back or roll-forward action. Also, for the first time, we present a solution- strategyhttps://www.researchgate.net/login for tackling dispensing errors during sample preparation. We use micro-electrode-dot-array (MEDA)-biochips that offer the advantages of manipulating fractional volumes of droplets (aliquots) for navigation as well as mix-split operations. Instead of performing traditional mix-and-split steps with integral-volume droplets, we execute only an aliquoting-and-mix sequence using differential-size aliquots. Thus, all split-operations, which are the main source of errors in conventional DMFBs, are completely eliminated, and hence, neither sensing nor any correcting action is needed, and further, no management ofhttps://www.researchgate.net/login intermediate waste droplets is needed. Additionally, the procedure can be fully parallelized for accurately producing multiple dilutions of a sample. Experimental results corroborate the superiority of the proposed method in terms of error management, and sample-preparation cost and time.

Langue: Anglais