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Snap-off production of monodisperse droplets

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Abstract.

We introduce a novel technique to produce monodisperse droplets through the snap-off mechanism. The methodology is simple, versatile, and requires no specialized or expensive components. The droplets produced have polydispersity < 1% and can be as small as 2.5μm radius. A convenient feature is that the droplet size is constant over a 100-fold change in flow rate, while at higher flows the droplet size can be continuously adjusted.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics & Astronomy and the Brockhouse Institute for Materials Research, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada

    Solomon Barkley & Kari Dalnoki-Veress

  2. Department of Physics, Emory University, 30322, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Eric R. Weeks

  3. PCT Lab, UMR CNRS 7083 Gulliver, ESPCI ParisTech, PSL Research University, Paris, France

    Kari Dalnoki-Veress

Authors
  1. Solomon Barkley
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  2. Eric R. Weeks
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  3. Kari Dalnoki-Veress
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Correspondence to Kari Dalnoki-Veress.

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Barkley, S., Weeks, E. & Dalnoki-Veress, K. Snap-off production of monodisperse droplets. Eur. Phys. J. E 38, 138 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2015-15138-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2015-15138-8

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