Microfluidic Droplet Pack

What is Droplet-Based Microfluidics? 

Principle of Emulsion 

An emulsion is a type of mixture composed of at least two immiscible liquids, where one liquid is dispersed in the other as droplets. Without emulsification, the two liquids would separate, with the less dense phase floating on top of the denser phase. Emulsions can take various forms, such as oil-in-water or water-in-oil, and multiple emulsions are also possible. You can conduct this type of experiment using a droplet pack. 

What are the advantages of this technology? 

Various mechanical devices, such as high-speed blenders, high-pressure valve homogenizers, and colloid mills, are commonly employed to produce droplets. These devices generate shear or impact stresses through manual or mechanical agitation, leading to droplet breakup. However, the stresses generated are often non-uniform across the system, resulting in polydisperse emulsions with varying droplet sizes. This limitation can be significant in many applications since emulsion stability is strongly influenced by droplet size. 

The production of droplets using microfluidic systems has become a vital technique for applications requiring monodisperse droplets. With the droplet pack, it becomes possible to generate droplets one at a time within micrometer-sized channels. The resulting droplets exhibit remarkable uniformity in size, enabling precise control in various applications. In fact, droplet size primarily depends on microfluidic channel dimensions, fluid properties, and flow rates employed. Droplet microfluidics facilitates highly monodispersed droplet production, reproducible generation of complex structures, manipulation of single droplets, and miniaturization of production and bioanalytical devices. 

Droplets have become an indispensable tool in chemical and biological research, with tangible success demonstrated through various mainstream commercial products that effectively address key biological and healthcare-related challenges. Examples of such products include Drop-seq and nucleic acid quantification via Droplet Digital PCR systems.