Advantages of Lab-on-a-chips

Lab-on-a-chips may provide advantages, which are specific to their application. Typical advantages are:

• low fluid volumes consumption (less waste, lower reagents costs and less required sample volumes for diagnostics)
• faster analysis and response times due to short diffusion distances, fast heating, high surface to volume ratios, small heat capacities.
• better process control because of a faster response of the system (e.g. thermal control for exothermic chemical reactions)
• compactness of the systems due to integration of much functionality and small volumes
• massive parallelization due to compactness, which allows high-throughput analysis
• lower fabrication costs, allowing cost-effective disposable chips, fabricated in mass production
• Part quality may be verified automatically
• safer platform for chemical, radioactive or biological studies because of integration of functionality, smaller fluid volumes and stored energies