DEVELOPMENT OF INTEGRATED MICROFLUIDIC DEVICE FOR OPTICAL FLOW RATE SENSING CHARUSLUK VIPHAVAKIT * ,†,‡ , CHRISTOS THEMISTOS † and MICHAEL KOMODROMOS † * Center of Excellence in Nanotechnology, Asian Institute of Technology, 12120 Pathumthani, Thailand † Department of Electrical Engineering, Frederick University, 7 Y. Frederickou Str., Nicosia 1036, Cyprus ‡ charusluk.v@gmail.com NITHI ATTHI § , SAKOOLKARN BOONRUENG ¶ , WALEED S. MOHAMMED ||,†† and JOYDEEP DUTTA ** § Thai Microelectronic Center (TMEC), Chachoengsao, Thailand ¶ Photonics Technology Laboratory, NECTEC, Pathumthani, Thailand || Center of Research in Optoelectronics, Communication and Control System (BU-CROCCS), Thailand ** Chair in Nanotechnology, Sultan Qaboos University, P. O. Box 17, Al Khodh 123, Oman †† wsoliman@gmail.com Received 15 March 2013 Accepted 19 June 2013 Published 7 November 2013 The design, fabrication and characterization of an optics based integrated °ow rate sensor is presented where the light-°uid interaction is maximized by allowing the liquid and light to propagate along the same direction. The °ow rate sensor consists of a 10 m deep microchannel placed between two waveguides. The optical waveguides were tapered to ¯t the channel width, to guide light in and out of the microchannel. A tapering mechanism is proposed to minimize the coupling and propagation losses. The power of the output signal from the designed device was calculate through simulation and it was compared with the actual output signal detected by a fast receiver (higher than 1 MHz). The dynamic change of the light intensity when °uid °ows through the channel can also be recorded by this receiver. This scheme allows for a direct measurement of the liquid °ow rate with higher interaction length between °uid and light with a ‡ Corresponding author. Journal of Circuits, Systems, and Computers Vol. 22, No. 9 (2013) 1340016 (8 pages) # . c World Scienti¯c Publishing Company DOI: 10.1142/S0218126613400161 1340016-1 J CIRCUIT SYST COMP 2013.22. Downloaded from www.worldscientific.com by Miss Charusluk Viphavakit on 11/27/13. For personal use only.