A four-layer initiative addressing the structural latency in microfluidics between what has been demonstrated, what can be bought as a commodity, and what can be built in-house.
The microfluidics field has, over thirty years, accumulated an unusually large gap between published technique and accessible practice. Compared to adjacent fields like semiconductors (TSMC PDKs, OpenROAD), molecular biology (Addgene, NEB), or open-source software (PyPI, crates.io), microfluidics has no equivalent clearinghouse for designs, recipes, or reference instruments. This project is an attempt to assemble one.
The methodology mirrors the Free Humanoid Corpus, extended into four parallel CC0 repositories addressing different layers of the latency problem.
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ free-microfluidics-project │
│ (umbrella docs, governance, releases) │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
│ │ │ │
▼ ▼ ▼ ▼
┌─────────────┐ ┌─────────────┐ ┌─────────────┐ ┌─────────────┐
│ corpus │ │ cad │ │ fab │ │ control │
│ prior-art │ │ chip designs│ │ fabrication│ │ instrument │
│ commons │ │ (chip CAD) │ │ recipes │ │ firmware/HW │
└─────────────┘ └─────────────┘ └─────────────┘ └─────────────┘
legal-citability publication → commodity → instrument
layer commodity gap in-house gap layer
Each repo is independently usable, CC0, and structurally similar (SCHEMA.md, validate.py, JSONL master file, cross-cut indexing where applicable, quarterly timestamped releases).
corpus/ — Free Microfluidics Corpus
Status: seeded (376 entries, 92 cross-cuts, 1883–2026)
A structured prior-art commons. Every entry is a defensive publication citable as 102/103 prior art at the moment of timestamped release. Subsystem cross-cuts make the corpus a working invalidity-search tool indexed by fabrication, pumping, valves, mixers, separators, droplets, detection, cell handling, thermal management, interfaces, and architecture.
This sub-tree is the most mature; it mirrors the Free Humanoid Corpus structurally with a 376-entry seed (375 commons-grade, 1 draft) and the full quality-bar / timestamping / Jekyll scaffolding.
cad/ — Free Microfluidics CAD
Status: seeded (38 designs, all draft pending CAD-file population)
A CC0 catalog of microfluidic chip designs. Each entry includes the device geometry (CAD files: GDSII, DXF, STL, KiCad), the intended fabrication path, the validated performance characteristics, and the provenance (paper, lab, license). Targets PDMS soft-lithography masters, glass photolithography mask sets, thermoplastic injection-mold tooling, and DLP-SLA print files.
The intent is to be the Addgene-equivalent for microfluidic chip designs — a place where a working group can deposit a validated design and any other group can fabricate it.
fab/ — Free Microfluidics Fab
Status: seeded (25 recipes, 24 commons-grade, 1 draft)
A CC0 catalog of microfluidic fabrication processes. Each entry is a step-by-step process recipe with critical-parameter documentation, equipment requirements, validated outcomes, and known failure modes. Covers SU-8 master mold processing, PDMS replica molding and bonding, glass HF etching, thermoplastic hot embossing, paper microfluidics patterning, DLP-SLA enclosed-channel printing, and benchtop nanofluidic fab.
The intent parallels the OpenIE GAA process spec for semiconductors: benchtop-realizable, critical-parameters-explicit fabrication procedures that work outside a foundry.
control/ — Free Microfluidics Control
Status: seeded (32 instruments, all draft pending hardware/firmware artifacts)
A CC0 catalog of microfluidic instrument designs: pressure controllers, syringe pumps, EWOD drivers, thermal cyclers, optical readout boards, and the firmware that runs them. KiCad PCBs, Rust firmware, mechanical CAD. The DropBot reference platform is the closest existing analog; this aims for production-grade open-source instrumentation across the whole microfluidic toolchain.
CC0 across every repo. Contribution model is described per-repo in each
CONTRIBUTING.md. The umbrella repo coordinates:
- Quarterly synchronized releases across all four sub-repos
- Cross-repo references (corpus entries can cite CAD designs; CAD entries can cite fab recipes; fab recipes can cite control instruments)
- Triple-cryptographic timestamping (FreeTSA + DigiCert + OpenTimestamps) applied uniformly
The project name reflects the OpenIE convention (open infrastructure projects in domains where IP and standards have ossified). It is part of the OpenIE family alongside the silicon, compute, corridor, and humanoid projects.
CC0-1.0 across all four sub-repos. See each repo's LICENSE for the
formal dedication.
- A research lab. It is a clearinghouse for work that already exists.
- A standards body. The schemas are descriptive, not prescriptive.
- A commercial venture. CC0 means no royalties, no licensing, no exclusivity.
- A wiki. Every entry is structured against a fixed schema and gated by
a quality bar enforced by
validate.py --strict.
git clone https://github.com/openIE-dev/free-microfluidics-project.git
cd free-microfluidics-project
# The corpus is the most populated; explore it first
cd corpus
python3 tools/lookup.py "pneumatic membrane valve"
python3 tools/lookup.py --tag droplet-flow-focusing-generation
# CAD, fab, and control are seeded — see each README for status and
# what shape of contribution turns drafts into commons-grade entries.
cd ../cad && cat README.md
cd ../fab && cat README.md
cd ../control && cat README.mdEach repo has its own CONTRIBUTING.md. The corpus is the most mature
and the easiest place to start: pick a paper, a product, or a fictional
depiction not yet in the corpus, run python3 tools/new_entry.py, and
open a PR.
For CAD/fab/control: the seed entries are mostly placeholders pending real artifacts (CAD files, validated recipe parameters, firmware/PCBs). If you have a chip design already in CC0 status, a working fab recipe documented to publication quality, or an open-source instrument with mature firmware, those are exactly the contributions that flip drafts into commons-grade entries.
Public domain (CC0 1.0). Part of OpenIE.