Research Avenues
Fluid-matter interaction in Deterministic Lateral Displacement structure based microfluidic devices
Research focus
This research involves the fabrication of microfluidic devices, especially for blood plasma separation. The manufacturing techniques explored here are ultra short pulsed laser micromachining, photolithography, Deep reactive ion etching and hybrid machining technique comprising of micromilling and electropolishing, Deterministic lateral displacement is observed in the fluid flow between the micropillars fabricated in the microchannels. This is useful in the separation of blood particles from plasma. Further, the effect of the fluid forces on the bending of the micropillars is studied with the major focus on the critical diameter of the particles being separated.
Structural auxetic materials in biomedical applications
Research focus
Development of collapsible structures with negative Poisson's ratio. These structures are crucial in deployable devices posing a challenge of geometry, size restrictions and compatibility. This project involves the design of shrinkable geometric configurations that behave differently than the natural structures, thus helping reduce sizes and miniaturisation.