Microfluidic Molecular Communication Transmitter Based on Hydrodynamic Gating

TL;DR

This paper introduces a microfluidic molecular communication transmitter utilizing hydrodynamic gating, providing an analytical model to optimize pulse generation for improved data transmission at the microscale.

Contribution

It presents a practical microfluidic transmitter design based on hydrodynamic gating and develops an analytical model validated by simulations to enhance molecular communication systems.

Findings

Analytical model accurately predicts pulse characteristics.

Model validated against COMSOL simulations.

Potential to optimize data rates and reduce interference.

Abstract

Molecular Communications (MC) is a bio-inspired paradigm for transmitting information using chemical signals, which can enable novel applications at the junction of biotechnology, nanotechnology, and information and communication technologies. However, designing efficient and reliable MC systems poses significant challenges due to the complex nature of the physical channel and the limitations of the micro/nanoscale transmitter and receiver devices. In this paper, we propose a practical microfluidic transmitter architecture for MC based on hydrodynamic gating, a widely utilized technique for generating chemical waveforms in microfluidic channels with high spatiotemporal resolution. We develop an approximate analytical model that can capture the fundamental characteristics of the generated molecular pulses, such as pulse width, pulse amplitude, and pulse delay, as functions of main system parameters, such as flow velocity and gating duration. We validate the accuracy of our model by comparing it with finite element simulations using COMSOL Multiphysics under various system settings. Our analytical model can enable the optimization of microfluidic transmitters for MC applications in terms of minimizing intersymbol interference and maximizing data transmission rate.