Controllable microfluidic production of microbubbles in water-in-oil emulsions and the formation of porous microparticles

Jiandi Wan, Alexander Bick, Matthew Sullivan, Howard A. Stone

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

149 Scopus citations

Abstract

The controlled formation of three-phase materials using microfluidic tools to obtain micrometer-dimension structuring was investigated. The effective elastic modulus of the dry photopolymerized polyacrylamide particles with and without entrapped microbubbles was investigated using atomic force microscope (AFM). The porous polyacrylamide particles showed relatively low elastic moduli compared to the particles without bubbles. An estimate of the gas fraction obtained by approxmating the number of gas bubbles in the porous particles gave an effective density. The control over the thickness of the water layer to obtain thin shells covering individual microbubbles was achieved by changing the microfluidic geometry and relative flow rate. It was observed that the technology has the potential to generate thin-polymer covered microbubbles or porous biopolymer microparticles for applications in ultrasound contrast materials.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)3314-3318
Number of pages5
JournalAdvanced Materials
Volume20
Issue number17
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 3 2008
Externally publishedYes

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • General Materials Science
  • Mechanics of Materials
  • Mechanical Engineering

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