Bonding of glass nanofluidic chips at room temperature by a one-step surface activation using an O2/CF4 plasma treatment.

Xu, Yan; Wang, Chenxi; Li, Lixiao; Matsumoto, Nobuhiro; Jang, Kihoon; Dong, Yiyang; Mawatari, Kazuma; Suga, Tadatomo et al. · Lab Chip · 2013

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

A technical bottleneck to the broadening of applications of glass nanofluidic chips is bonding, due to the strict conditions, especially the extremely high temperatures (~1000 °C) and the high vacuum required in the current glass-to-glass fusion bonding method. Herein, we report a strong, nanostructure-friendly, and high pressure-resistant bonding method, performed at room temperature (RT, ~25 °C) for glass nanofluidic chips, using a one-step surface activation process with an O(2)/CF(4) gas mixture plasma treatment. The developed RT bonding method is believed to be able to conquer the technical bottleneck in bonding in nanofluidic fields.