Deformation and breakup dynamics of droplets within a tapered channel

TL;DR

This study uses numerical simulations to analyze how droplets deform and break up in a tapered microchannel, providing detailed insights into the hydrodynamics and introducing a deformation parameter for system characterization.

Contribution

It demonstrates the effectiveness of a mesoscale multicomponent fluid approach in capturing droplet breakup dynamics in tapered channels, aligning with experimental results.

Findings

Numerical method accurately reproduces experimental droplet breakup behaviors.

Hydrodynamic phenomena during breakup are detailed and clarified.

A new deformation parameter effectively characterizes droplet deformation states.

Abstract

In this paper we numerically investigate the breakup dynamics of droplets in an emulsion flowing in a tapered microchannel with a narrow constriction. The mesoscale approach for multicomponent fluids with near contact interactions is shown to capture the deformation and breakup dynamics of droplets interacting within the constriction, in agreement with experimental evidences. In addition, it permits to investigate in detail the hydrodynamic phenomena occurring during the breakup stages. Finally, a suitable deformation parameter is introduced and analyzed to characterize the state of deformation of the system by inspecting pairs of interacting droplets flowing in the narrow channel.