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Updated: Nov 2, 2025
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Microfluidic Chips for In Situ Crystal X-ray Diffraction and In Situ Dynamic Light Scattering for Serial Crystallography
Published on: April 24, 2018
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Advanced continuous-flow microfluidic device for parallel screening of crystal polymorphs, morphology, and kinetics
Paria Coliaie1, Manish S Kelkar2, Marianne Langston3
1Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 60607, USA. mrsingh@uic.edu.
Lab on a Chip
|June 7, 2021
Summary
A novel microfluidic device enables parallel screening of crystalline materials, significantly reducing screening time and improving reproducibility for active pharmaceutical ingredient discovery. This breakthrough offers a more efficient method for materials science research.
Area of Science:
- Materials Science
- Chemical Engineering
- Pharmaceutical Science
Background:
- Continuous-flow microfluidic devices allow controlled crystal nucleation but suffer from downstream composition variation due to solute depletion.
- Existing methods lead to irreproducible crystal growth conditions, hindering large-scale synthesis and reliable screening.
- There is a need for continuous-flow microfluidic devices capable of trapping and growing crystals under controlled, parallel conditions.
Purpose of the Study:
- To present a blueprint for a multi-well microfluidic device designed for simultaneous, parallel screening of crystalline materials under diverse conditions.
- To demonstrate the device's efficacy in screening polymorphs, morphology, and growth rates of l-histidine.
- To compare the performance of the microfluidic device against conventional screening methods.
Main Methods:
- Development of a microfluidic device featuring parallel-connected micromixers for simultaneous crystal trapping and growth.
- Antisolvent crystallization of l-histidine under eight different solution conditions (molar concentration, ethanol vol%, supersaturation).
- Comparative analysis with a conventional 96-well microtiter plate for screening accuracy and efficiency.
Main Results:
- The multi-well microfluidic device successfully screened l-histidine polymorphs, morphology, and growth rates in approximately 30 minutes.
- Screening time was reduced by at least eightfold compared to sequential screening processes.
- The microfluidic device provided more accurate and less uncertain measurements of crystal properties than the 96-well plate, which overestimated stable forms.
Conclusions:
- The developed multi-well microfluidic device enables efficient, parallel, and combinatorial screening of crystalline materials.
- This technology significantly improves reproducibility and reduces screening time for active pharmaceutical ingredients and other crystalline materials.
- The device represents a next-generation platform for automated, high-throughput screening in materials science and drug discovery.
