March 12, 2008 — ALine’s newest family of ultra-low volume, disposable UV transparent microfluidic cuvettes for fluorescence, the FluoroVette, and for absorbance, the SpecVette, offer easy-fill pipette ports or hose barb adapters for flowing applications. ALine’s microfluidics cuvettes work in standard laboratory instrumentation, such as a spectrometer, or sit on a microscope stage.

FluoroVettes hold 50 microliters with nanomolar range fluorescence detection sensitivity. The rugged and high-quality design provides a cost savings of 90% over traditional quartz sub-micro cuvettes, according to company claims. The patent-pending design eliminates air bubbles, can be used as a flowcell, with UV transparency to 220nm. Customization further permits applications for bead-based displacement assays or membrane-based reactions or as a dual chamber design for diffusion experiments across a membrane. The thin transparent window permits high magnification on a microscope stage, while the universal adaptor permits ready interface to a standard single sample fluorimeter.

The SpecVette, for absorbance, is available in path lengths of 250, 500, and 1000 microns, and only requires a few micro liters of sample solution, eliminating many challenges associated with measuring highly concentrated samples using traditional short path cuvettes. SpecVettes are path length-matched and have 1% to 2% error across the entire UV-VIS spectrum for 25 different cuvettes. A universal adapter allows SpecVettes to be used with any spectrometer with a z-height of 12 to 20mm. Other features include UV transparency to 220nm, and an “easy-to-fill” pipette tip port. Optional flowcell connections or transparent interdigitated electrodes further expand its capabilities for specialty applications.