Hi all,
I am cleaning my microfluidic devices using these steps:
1. manually perfusing ethanol
2. manually perfusing PBS
3. Keep in desiccator for drying
4. UV under culture hood for 30 mins.
However, I doubt if desiccation is right thing to do or not because desiccator is not sterile environment. What do you suggest? Thanks in advance!
You should not make the final rinse a salt solution. DI water would be the best final rinse. If you plan to store the devices for weeks, then you can just wash with alcohol and let it evaporate. You should be doing a rinse with blank media before use to prep the device. UV in the hood will not sterilize the inside of your device, you can use the alcohol to sterilize or 1M HCl if you think there are proteinaceous residues or fungal spores. Desication should not be necessary, you can extract to water with a syringe if need be but we usually keep our sterile devices wet since it makes loading easier when you're ready to use the device. Our devices are usually not stored for more than a few days.
Ron Reiserer Thank you for your response. So if I understood your answer correctly, then you are suggesting these steps , Let me know If I am correct or not.
1. Clean with Ethanol
2. Keep in flow hood for evaporation
3. Rinse with media before loading cells
So I am not using DI water after ethanol wash so that way I don't need to dry the chip in desiccator right? Because If I don't dry, due to water inside the channel, I might have a risk of formation of bubbles.
Thank you.
I would suggest putting the devices in a sterile container that you can remove from the hood until you are ready to use it. You should not make the assumption that your hood stays sterile all the time. You should remove everything from the hood at the end of each use and clean the hood before each use. If you leave anything in the hood it will be a hiding place for contaminants.
If your device starts to dry out after rinsing with DI water, you will definitely start seeing bubbles in the channels. We typically keep out devices wet both inside and out so they do not dry out.
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