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9.2 Microfluidic system 225

FIGURE 9.6 The most important power loss effects with a brief overview of suitable
countermeasures.

Fig. 9.6 shows the most important power loss effects together with a brief over-
view of suitable countermeasures. Increasing the power delivered by the high-fre-
quency signal source is the simplest and efficient approach to counteract the power
loss. However, an increase in the power available by high-frequency sources results
in cost increases. Additionally, an inefficient device operation due to the power
loss can increase the local temperature of microfluidic devices, which can lead to
decreased system performance, especially for portable devices. In portable devices
and integrated high-power devices including SAW atomizers, acoustic tweezers,
and mixers, the power that source provides should be used with the highest pos-
sible efficiency to minimize costs, system size, and temperature-associated device
degradation.
It is possible to do different reactions against the power loss that leads to the
extension of the applicability and performance of SAW actuators into the field of
hand-held devices, portable devices, and devices with high power need. In the fol-
lowing section the microfluidic systems are more explained.

9.2 Microfluidic system

Since the motion of fluids is involved in most of biological assays and biological
procedures, the emergence of microfluidics has become a useful tool for biological
applications and analysis. Due to the advantages of microfluidic, they are used in a
variety of application including detection and separation, small-scale chemical and
micro-/nano-particle synthesis, single-cell biology, drug delivery, cell culture, DNA
chips, lab-on-a-chip technology, micro-propulsion, and micro-thermal technologies,
coculture system for studying the interactions between tumor cells, or bacteria sys-
tem, or neighboring normal cells for characterizing the effects of new drugs, clinical
diagnostic applications, assisted reproductive technology (e.g., in vitro fertiliza-
tion) [17,18], studying resistance to chemotherapy, screening, and optimizing drug