Fluid Flower : Microliquid Patterning via Drop Impact

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a novel microfluidic patterning technique using drop impact on wettability-patterned surfaces, enabling liquid micropatterning without solid microstructures, which reduces friction and fabrication costs.

Contribution

It introduces a new method for micropatterning liquids via drop impact on wettability-patterned surfaces, avoiding traditional micromachining.

Findings

Water drops retract quickly on hydrophobic regions

Drops are arrested on hydrophilic areas during impact

Patterning can be controlled by surface wettability

Abstract

In microfluidic technologies, direct patterning of liquid without resorting to micromachined solid structures has various advantages including reduction of the frictional dissipation and the fabrication cost. This fluid dynamics video illustrates the method to micropattern a liquid on a solid surface with drop impact. We experimentally show that a water drop impacting with the wettability-patterned solid retracts fast on the hydrophobic regions while being arrested on the hydrophilic areas.