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Enhanced-throughput production of polymersomes using a parallelized capillary microfluidic device

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Abstract

We report a parallelized capillary microfluidic device for enhanced production rate of monodisperse polymersomes. This device consists of four independent capillary microfluidic devices, operated in parallel; each device produces monodisperse water-in-oil-in-water (W/O/W) double-emulsion drops through a single-step emulsification. During generation of the double-emulsion drops, the innermost water drop is formed first and it triggers a breakup of the middle oil phase over wide range of flow rates; this enables robust and stable formation of the double-emulsion drops in all drop makers of the parallelized device. Double-emulsion drops are transformed to polymersomes through a dewetting of the amphiphile-laden middle oil phase on the surface of the innermost water drop, followed by the subsequent separation of the oil drop. Therefore, we can make polymersomes with a production rate enhanced by a factor given by the number of drop makers in the parallelized device.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by Amore-Pacific, the National Science Foundation (DMR-1006546) and the Harvard Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (DMR-0820484).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics and School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Shin-Hyun Kim & David A. Weitz

  2. Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, KAIST, Daejeon, South Korea

    Shin-Hyun Kim

  3. Department of Applied Chemistry, Hanyang University, Ansan, South Korea

    Jin Woong Kim

  4. Amore-Pacific Co. R&D Center, Yongin, South Korea

    Do-Hoon Kim & Sang-Hoon Han

Authors
  1. Shin-Hyun Kim
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  2. Jin Woong Kim
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  3. Do-Hoon Kim
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  4. Sang-Hoon Han
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  5. David A. Weitz
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Correspondence to Shin-Hyun Kim or David A. Weitz.

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Kim, SH., Kim, J.W., Kim, DH. et al. Enhanced-throughput production of polymersomes using a parallelized capillary microfluidic device. Microfluid Nanofluid 14, 509–514 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10404-012-1069-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10404-012-1069-5

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