COLIN KING BEng MIEI
PhD Research Postgraduate (2003-2006)

e: colin.king@ul.ie

t: +353-61-213112

Colin King graduated with a BEng in Aeronautical Engineering from the University of Limerick in 2003. Colin worked with Airbus S.A.S. in the Flight Operations Support – Line Assistance department on the development of a flight operations monitoring programme. Following the completion of his degree, Colin returned to UL to carry out research in the area of microfluidics. His primary research interests include natural convection and two phase microfluidics with applications in the polymerase chain reaction.

PhD Project Title: A Two Phase Flow Microfluidic Natural Convection Polymerase Chain Reaction Device

The Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) is a technique used to amplify DNA. This technique may be used in the genetic screening of patients for a variety of diseases. The challenge is to reduce the costs associated with such screening by scaling down and increasing the throughput of the process. This research addresses some of the issues involved in the implementation of a PCR device for high throughput screening on the microscale.

The photograph shown below is of an annular channel used to study the manipulation of PCR reagents using natural convection at the microscale level.