Virus concentration and purification by a microfluidic filtering system with an integrated PEGylated antifouling membrane

We present the integration of a nanoporous membrane functionalized with hydrophilic polymer brushes, poly(ethylene glycol) methacrylate (PEGMA), into a microfluidic device. In order to prevent damage to functional groups on the membrane surfaces, the PEGMA-modified membrane was directly bonded using an intermediate UV-curable adhesive layer by employing the modified “Stamp-and-Stick (SAS)” method and operated at high pressures. We demonstrated that the degree of flux recovery (RFR) of the functionalized membrane during testing with bovine serum albumin, that reached 93% after a cleaning process while unmodified membranes showed only 63% of RFR. The viral particle recovery efficiency and concentration factor were 60.41% and 6.04, respectively.