Table 1 Comparison of droplet size and production rate in this work vs. previous microfluidic techniques designed for high throughput production of micron- and submicron-sized droplets
From: Gas-assisted microfluidic step-emulsification for generating micron- and submicron-sized droplets
Method | \({d}_{o}\) (CV) [μm] (%) | Rate f [drops/sec] (single channel) | Rate f [drops/sec] (parallelized channel) | Channel depth b [μm] | Microfabrication method |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Co-flow SE27 | 0.4 | ~104 | / | 0.1 | Glass etching |
Co-flow SE26 | 0.9 (1%) | 1.5 × 104 | / | 0.42 | PDMS |
Cross-flow submicron channel48 | 1.4 (16.7%) | 15 | ~104 | 0.32 | Silicon |
Air-assisted SE (this work) | 2.7 (11%) | 1.88 × 104 | / | 1.8 | PDMS |
Straight-through Microchannel49 | 4.4 (<6%) | >30 | ~3 × 104 | 1.7 | Silicon |
Microchannels43 | 5 | 134.5 | 2 × 106–2 × 107 | 1.8 | Silicon |
SE in array50 | 8 | 270 | 6.7 × 104 | 2 | PDMS |
Multi-EDGE46 | 10 (<10%) | >1800 | 4.8 × 106 | 2 | Silicon |
Microchannels45 | 14.1 (<3%) | 2.8 | ~5 × 103 | 4 | Silicon |
Flow focusing and T-junction in array44 | 24.5 (2.4%) | ~104 | ~108 | 22.5 | Silicon + glass |
