Abstract
We present a 512-channel geometric droplet-splitting microfluidic device that involves the injection of a premixed emulsion for microsphere production. The presented microfluidic device was fabricated using conventional photolithography and polydimethylsiloxane casting. The fabricated microfluidic device consisted of 512 channels with 256 T-junctions in the last branch. Five hundred and twelve microdroplets with a narrow size distribution were produced from a single liquid droplet. The diameter and size distribution of prepared micro water droplets were 35.29 µm and 8.8% at 10 mL/h, respectively. Moreover, we attempted to prepare biocompatible microspheres for demonstrating the presented approach. The diameter and size distribution of the prepared poly (lactic-co-glycolic acid) microspheres were 6.56 µm and 8.66% at 10 mL/h, respectively. To improve the monodispersity of the microspheres, we designed an additional post array part in the 512-channel geometric droplet-splitting microfluidic device. The monodispersity of the microdroplets prepared with the microfluidic device combined with the post array part exhibited a significant improvement.
Highlights
Microspheres have been used as carriers to deliver functional materials such as drugs, proteins, and chemicals [1,2]
Monodispersed microspheres have potential value for use as particulate blood analogues [5,6,7]. They have been mainly used as microfluidic systems to prepare monodispersed microspheres
Despite the promise of microfluidic system, conventional microfluidic systems have the limitations of low production rates and complexity for microsphere preparation [10,11,12]
Summary
Microspheres have been used as carriers to deliver functional materials such as drugs, proteins, and chemicals [1,2]. Our group proposed 512 channel T-junction passive breakup devices for preparing microspheres, which generate monodispersed chitosan microspheres at 42.7 kHz, but its microsphere production rate required improvement for mass production [18]. To overcome this limitation, we can consider the injection of premixed emulsion into a microfluidic device as an alternative approach [19,20]. A design based on a single micro channel can drastically decrease flow resistance, which is the most important factor governing the production of microspheres at high flow rates This microfluidic device only required conventional photolithography and PDMS casting for fabrication, without any additional fabrication processes or additional devices. Three types of post array parts are evaluated in terms of droplet splitting and size distribution
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
