We use direct femtosecond laser writing to integrate optical waveguides into a commercial fused silica capillary electrophoresis
chip. High-quality waveguides crossing the microfluidic channels are fabricated and used to optically address, with high spatial
selectivity, their content. Fluorescence from the optically excited volume is efficiently collected at a 90° angle by a high
numerical aperture fiber, resulting in a highly compact and portable device. To test the platform we performed electrophoresis
and detection of a 23-mer oligonucleotide plug. Our approach is quite powerful because it allows the integration of photonic
functionalities, by simple post-processing, into commercial LOCs fabricated with standard techniques.
Figure Femtosecond laser written waveguides can selectively excite fluorescence in a microfluidic channel of a commercial lab-on-a-chip.
A compact scheme for on-chip detection by laser induced fluorescence is applied to capillary electrophoresis of a 23-mer Cy3-labeled
oligonucleotide
Keywords Lab-on-a-chip - Microfluidics - Optical waveguides - Capillary electrophoresis - Laser-induced fluorescence