Inkjet printing of polymer micro-arrays and libraries: Instrumentation, requirements, and perspectives

A review. This article reviews com. available instrumentation for ink-jet printing of polymer microarrays for combinatorial materials research and requirements thereof. These include a print head positioning accuracy better than 10 mm and a min. drop vol. of 100 pL. Com. available instruments that fulfill these requirements can be divided into two categories, depending on whether they receive ink from a reservoir (dispense mode) or through fluid aspiration (pipet mode). Instruments belonging to the first category are restricted to the prepn. of polymer blend micro-arrays. These consist of a few substances mixed in various ratios. The other instruments can be used for the prepn. of both micro-arrays of large nos. of different pure polymer compds. and polymer blend micro-arrays. Moreover, ways to mix compds. are discussed. [on SciFinder (R)]