I need suggestions of polymers or any other elastic materials that could be or already are used instead of glass as cover slips. So, essential points besides elasticity are:

  • refractive index (about 1.52 I assume)
  • tunable thickness (0.17mm +/- 0.01mm or better)
  • usable in LiSci conditions: aquaeous solution at RT and a pH about 7.0
  • to withstand intensive light (confocal LSM and UV laser)
  • Eventually, I'm aiming at designing a microfluidic tool from PDMS and that cover glass replacement. So the next important issue to solve is: How could effective bonding of PDMS to that elastic "cover slip" be achieved? Speaking of Mineral glass and PDMS, a plasma treatment allows for a covalent bonding, which has proven very effective.

    So for my case, I considered a silicon-based polymer coating on the cover slip. It could mediate plasma bonding to PDMS, as it could work in some way as a replacement for mineral glass Surface, presenting Si-OH groups that could polymerize w/ PDMS, forming covalent Si-O-Si bonds.

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