Fig. 3: Viscoelasticity and embolization effectiveness of Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets in vitro.

a Rheology of the Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets, lipiodol and 8spheres® beads by shear rate sweeps. The viscosity of the Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets and the 8spheres® beads significantly decreased with the increase of the shear rate, which is beneficial to transcatheter injection. b The injection force curves of Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets with different sizes. c Storage modulus (G′) and loss modulus (G′′) of the Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets, lipiodol, and 8spheres® beads as characterized by oscillatory strain sweeps, respectively. d Optical microscope images of Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets with different shapes. Scale bars: 30 μm. e CT images of Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets with different shapes. Scale bars: 30 μm. f Embolization effectiveness of Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets in a capillary glass tube. Scale bars: left is 100 μm, center is 100 μm, and right is 200 μm. g Comparison of packing densities of clinical 8spheres® beads and Janus particle-engineered structural droplets. Scale bars: 0.5 cm. h Photograph of the decellularized liver of a Sprague-Dawley rat. Scale bar: 1 cm. i Photograph of the decellularized liver after injecting Janus particle-engineered structural droplets into blood vessels. Scale bar: 1 cm. j CT images of the decellularized liver after embolizing of Janus particle-engineered structural droplets. The Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets smoothly distributed into the whole blood vessels. Scale bar: 1 cm. k–o Optical microscope images of the embolization effectiveness of Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets within different levels of blood vessels of decellularized liver. Within these Figures, I, II, III, IV, V represents the different blood vessel zone in decellularized liver from (h). Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets are closely packed into the blood vessels. Except for embolizing the feeding artery, they could also travel distally to embolize finer vasculatures by viscoelastic deformation. Scale bars: 100 μm. Experiments were performed three times (d–o), with similar results. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.