New sensors for magnetic flow cytometry!

After more than one year of designing and testing new sensor layouts, new wafers with novel features for our bio-sensing applications arrived. Essential parts are the highly sensitive giant magnetoresistive (GMR) sensing elements relying on the Noble Prize-winning GMR-effect. Furthermore, magnetophoretic guiding and enrichment structures are integrated for precise magnetic particle manipulation enabling highly integrated workflows. For protecting these sensitive elements from the harsh conditions of blood and other biological material, the whole chip is passivated with a nanometre-thin layer of silicon nitride. However, this is the basis substrate for bonding complex microfluidic channels and realising surface functionalisations in our magnetic flow cytometry research.