Light for microdrops: Antoine's paper highlighted in CNRS website



21 Oct 2011. Antoine's paper entitled "Photoreversible Fragmentation of a Liquid Interface for Micro-Droplet Generation by Light Actuation", which was illustrated on the cover of Lab on a Chip, has just been highlighted in the website of CNRS:
Click here to read the highlight


Abstract:
We describe a new method to induce by light a reversible switch from a continuous two-phase laminar flow to a droplet generating regime, in microfluidic devices with a usual water-in-oil flow focusing geometry. It consists in adding a photosensitive surfactant to the aqueous phase to modulate using light the interfacial energy between flowing liquids and the microfluidic substrate. We show that UV irradiation induces liquid fragmentation into monodisperse water microdroplets and that many cycles of reversible and rapid switches (< 2 s) between continuous laminar flows and stable droplet regimes can be realized. By spatially controlling the application of the light stimulus, we also demonstrate the first spatially resolved remote induction of droplet generation.

Reference:
Photoreversible Fragmentation of a Liquid Interface for Micro-Droplet Generation by Light Actuation
A. Diguet, H. Li, N. Queyriaux, Y. Chen, D. Baigl*
Lab Chip 2011, 11, 2666-2669
- doi : 10.1039/C1LC20328B

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