Out-of-Plane Cup Shaped Stainless Steel Microneedle Array for Drug Delivery

To improve the transdermal delivery of drug, there are many techniques have been reported (Chemical, Iontophoresis, Sonophoresis and Microneedle). Among these techniques, the microneedle technology gained the more attention in recent years. Mainly, there are two types (Solid and Hollow) of microneedles have been reported for the successful drug delivery application. In this paper, we report on the fabrication of out-of-plane solid Stainless Steel (SS) microneedles and formation of microcup structure within them suitable for drug delivery application. Array of out-of-plane solid SS microneedles were fabricated using Electric Discharge Machining (EDM) method. Subsequently, the microcup structures on the solid SS microneedles were formed using Focused Ion Beam (FIB) technique. The microcup structure on the microneedles acts as a dedicated region to fill the drug, so that the possible drug leakage while inserting the microneedles into the skin can be avoided. The drug filling into the microcup structures was performed using drop coating method. This coating method in combination with cup shaped microneedle array enables to deliver multiple drugs simultaneously in desired proportion

A Perspective on Microneedle-Based Drug Delivery and Diagnostics in Paediatrics

Microneedles (MNs) have been extensively explored in the literature as a means to deliver drugs in the skin, surpassing the stratum corneum permeability barrier. MNs are potentially easy to produce and may allow the self-administration of drugs without causing pain or bleeding. More recently, MNs have been investigated to collect/assess the interstitial fluid in order to monitor or detect specific biomarkers. The integration of these two concepts in closed-loop devices holds the promise of automated and minimally invasive disease detection/monitoring and therapy. These assure low invasiveness and, importantly, open a window of opportunity for the application of population-specific and personalised therapies.</jats:p

Waferscale electrostatic quadrupole array for multiple ION beam manipulation

We report on the first through-wafer silicon-based Electrostatic Quadrupole Array (ESQA) to focus high energy ion beams. This device is a key enabler for a wafer-based accelerator architecture that lends itself to orders-of-magnitude reduction in cost, volume and weight of charged particle accelerators. ESQs are a key building block in developing compact Multiple Electrostatic Quadrupole Array Linear Accelerator (MEQALAC) [1]. In a MEQALAC electrostatic forces are used to focus ions, and electrostatic field scaling permits high beam current densities by decreasing the beam aperture size for a given peak electric field set by breakdown limitations. Using multiple parallel beams, each totaling to an area A, can result in higher total beam current compared to a single aperture beam of the same area. Smaller dimensions also allow for higher focusing electric field gradients and therefore higher average beam current density. Here we demonstrate that Deep Reactive Ion Etching (DRIE) micromachined pillar electrodes, electrically isolated by silicon-nitride thin films enable higher performance ESQA with waferscale scalability. The fabricated ESQA are able to hold up toi kV in air. A 3×3 array of 12 keV argon ion beams are focused in a wafer accelerator unit cell to pave the way for multiple wafer accelerator

Peristaltic pump-based low range pressure sensor calibration system

Peristaltic pumps were normally used to pump liquids in several chemical and biological applications. In the present study, a peristaltic pump was used to pressurize the chamber (positive as well negative pressures) using atmospheric air. In the present paper, we discuss the development and performance study of an automatic pressurization system to calibrate low range (millibar) pressure sensors. The system includes a peristaltic pump, calibrated pressure sensor (master sensor), pressure chamber, and the control electronics. An in-house developed peristaltic pump was used to pressurize the chamber. A closed loop control system has been developed to detect and adjust the pressure leaks in the chamber. The complete system has been integrated into a portable product. The system performance has been studied for a step response and steady state errors. The system is portable, free from oil contaminants, and consumes less power compared to existing pressure calibration systems. The veracity of the system was verified by calibrating an unknown diaphragm based pressure sensor and the results obtained were satisfactory. (C) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC

Demonstration of waferscale voltage amplifier and electrostatic quadrupole focusing array for compact linear accelerators

Compact linear accelerators, with beam energies in the kiloelectron volt to megaelectron volt range, have applications in medicine, neutron/X-ray generation, surface modifications, etc. The size, weight, and power of existing accelerators preclude them from mass availability in portable formats. This paper presents a specific implementation of an ion accelerator architecture based on planar wafers with accelerating and focusing sections. Our low cost approach allows the control of the final ion beam energy with potential applications, for example, for accelerator-based ion implantation. In this paper, we demonstrate two important waferscale modules required to build a linear particle accelerator; these include (1) on-wafer voltage amplification for beam acceleration using Inductor-Capacitor (LC) resonators and (2) waferscale electrostatic quadrupole arrays (ESQA) to refocus the ion beams during transport. On-board LC resonators were developed using Printed Circuit Board fabrication processes to implement an LC element resonant at ∼16.6 MHz with a quality factor of 25. An energy gain of ∼250 eV was observed using a two wafer acceleration unit with an argon ion beam with 6.5 keV initial energy. A 3 × 3 ESQA was fabricated on a glass wafer with metal electrodes formed by depositing copper metal around the beam apertures. The ESQA was used to focus and defocus an argon ion beam, demonstrating a field gradient of ∼500 V over a gap of ∼250 μm

Staging of RF-accelerating Units in a MEMS-based Ion Accelerator

Multiple Electrostatic Quadrupole Array Linear Accelerators (MEQALACs) provide an opportunity to realize compact radio- frequency (RF) accelerator structures that can deliver very high beam currents. MEQALACs have been previously realized with acceleration gap distances and beam aperture sizes of the order of centimeters. Through advances in Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) fabrication, MEQALACs can now be scaled down to the sub-millimeter regime and batch processed on wafer substrates. In this paper we show first results from using three RF stages in a compact MEMS-based ion accelerator. The results presented show proof-of-concept with accelerator structures formed from printed circuit boards using a 3 × 3 beamlet arrangement and noble gas ions at 10 keV. We present a simple model to describe the measured results. We also discuss some of the scaling behaviour of a compact MEQALAC. The MEMS-based approach enables a low-cost, highly versatile accelerator covering a wide range of currents (10 μA to 100 mA) and beam energies (100 keV to several MeV). Applications include ion-beam analysis, mass spectrometry, materials processing, and at very high beam powers, plasma heating