Asymmetric droplet splitting is a common method to obtain micro-droplets of different sizes. The study of droplet asymmetric splitting behaviors is of great significance to the fields of biomedicine, energy, chemical industry and food engineering. In this paper, the control flow is introduced into a branch of the T-shaped microchannel to control the pressure distribution in the channel and precisely control the size of the daughter droplets. The method is simple to operate and is a preferred method for asymmetric microfluidic splitting. Existing studies have analyzed droplet splitting modes, critical conditions for flow pattern transitions, and splitting dynamics, but the theoretical prediction of droplet asymmetric splitting behaviors needs to be strengthened. Moreover, compared with tunnel splitting and obstructed splitting, which are more abundantly studied, neither semi-obstructed splitting as an intermediate state of tunnel splitting nor obstructed splitting is analyzed sufficiently. Therefore, a microfluidic T-junction chip is designed and fabricated, with which asymmetrical splitting behaviors of droplets with a tunnel in a microfluidic T-junction are investigated experimentally. The influence of flow rate regulation on the droplet splitting ratio is studied. And a theoretical model is also established to predict the splitting ratio. The results are concluded as follows: 1) the process of asymmetrical droplet splitting is divided into three stages i.e. early squeezing, late squeezing and rapid pinch-off stage. In the early stage of squeezing, the radius of curvature of the droplet neck is sizable, and the additional pressure of interfacial tension is minor. Compared with the additional pressure that hinders neck contraction, the upstream continuous phase driving force is dominant, and the width of the neck changes linearly with time; in the process of late squeezing, the upstream pressure driving effect is still greater than the hindering effect of the additional tension, and the neck width changes exponentially with time; However, in the rapid pinch-off stage, the interfacial tension pointing to the center of the cross section of droplet neck dominates the pinch-off stage. Then, the droplet neck shrinks sharply. 2) Adjusting the flow rate of the branch channel can effectively control the asymmetric splitting ratio of the droplets, and under the current semi-obstructed asymmetric splitting of the droplets, the regulation effect is less affected by the size of the mother droplet, but more affected by the capillary number. 3) The prediction model of droplet splitting ratio based on the pressure drop model can effectively predict the droplet splitting ratio.
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