Patent ID: 7280727
Filing Date: 2007-10-09
Classification: B01L,G01N

Abstract:
1. A method of fabricating a well plate comprising: fabricating a fused fiber bundle including a plurality of adjacently fused fibers extending generally along a longitudinal axis, each fiber including a core and cladding material collapsed and fused about the core, the core being soluble in a core solvent in which the cladding material is relatively insoluble; cutting the fused fiber bundle along a plane that extends perpendicularly to the longitudinal axis to form a fused fiber plate having opposed first and second faces; exposing the fused fiber plate to the core solvent in order to dissolve each core of a selected set of cores and form a capillary plate comprising fused cladding material including a plurality of through-voids extending through the capillary plate between the first and second faces and corresponding in position and cross-sectional geometry to the pre-etch positions and cross-sectional geometries of the dissolved cores; providing a base plate including first and second sides; and bonding one side of the base plate one of (i) to the first face of the fused fiber plate prior to dissolving cores from the fiber plate and (ii) to the first face of the capillary plate subsequent to the formation thereof in order to define a unitary well plate including a plurality of wells each of which wells is defined by an open top end, a closed bottom end and a well wall comprised of cladding material and extending between the open top and closed bottom ends, wherein the base plate is a fused fiber optic faceplate comprising a plurality of adjacently-bonded optical fiber image conduits.