The use of microfluidic drops as microreactors hinges on the active control of certain fundamental operations, such as droplet formation, transport, division and fusion. Recent work has demonstrated that local heating from a focused laser can apply a thermocapillary force on a liquid interface sufficient to block the advance of a droplet in a microchannel (Baroud et al., Phys. Rev. E. V 75, p.046302). Here, we demonstrate the usefulness of this optical approach by implementing the operations mentioned above, without the need for any special microfabrication or moving parts. Building blocks such as a droplet valve, sorter, fuser, or divider are shown, as is the combination of a valve and fuser using a single laser spot.

International audienceThe clogging of porous media by colloidal particles is a complex process which relies on many different physical phenomena. The formation and the structure of a clog results from the interplay between hydrodynamics (flow rate and pore geometry) and the DLVO forces (particle–particle and particle–wall). In order to get a better understanding of this process, we study the clogging of a microfluidic filter, at the single pore level, and determine the influence of each relevant parameter separately. We show that in order to form stable clogs, colloidal particles have to pile up over a length in the flow direction roughly equal to the width of the pore. We found that there are two clogging regimes, which depend on the applied pressure. In the first one, at low pressures, the length of the clog within the pore and the number of particles that pass through the pore prior to clogging are constant. In the second one, for higher pressures, both quantities increase with the pressure. We also show that a higher ionic strength accelerates the clog formation, keeping constant the length of the clo

The development of microfluidic devices is still hindered by the lack of robust fundamental building blocks that constitute any fluidic system. An attractive approach is optical actuation because light field interaction is contactless and dynamically reconfigurable, and solutions have been anticipated through the use of optical forces to manipulate microparticles in flows. Following the concept of "optical chip" advanced from the optical actuation of suspensions, we propose in this survey new routes to extend this concept to microfluidic two-phase flows. First, we investigate the destabilization of fluid interfaces by the optical radiation pressure and the formation of liquid jets. We analyze the droplet shedding from the jet tip and the continuous transport in laser-sustained liquid channels. In a second part, we investigate a dissipative light-flow interaction mechanism consisting in heating locally two immiscible fluids to produce thermocapillary stresses along their interface. This opto-capillary coupling is implemented in adequate microchannel geometries to manipulate two-phase flows and propose a contactless optical toolbox including valves, droplet sorters and switches, droplet dividers or droplet mergers. Finally, we discuss radiation pressure and opto-capillary effects in the context of the "optical-chip" where flows, channels and operating functions would all be performed optically on the same device.

Bronchial diseases are characterised by the weak efficiency of mucus transport through the lower airways, leading in some cases to the muco-obstruction of bronchi. It has been hypothesised that this loss of clearance results from alterations in the mucus rheology, which are reflected in sputum samples collected from patients, making sputum rheology a possible biophysical marker of these diseases and their evolution. However, previous rheological studies have focused on quasi-static viscoelastic (linear storage and loss moduli) properties only, which are not representative of the mucus mobilisation within the respiratory tract. In this paper, we extend this approach further, by analysing both quasi-static and some dynamic (flow point) properties, to assess their usability and relative performance in characterising several chronic bronchial diseases (asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and cystic fibrosis) and distinguishing them from healthy subjects. We demonstrate that pathologies influence substantially the linear and flow properties. Linear moduli are weakly condition-specific and even though the corresponding ranges overlap, distinct levels can be identified. This directly relates to the specific mucus structure in each case. In contrast, the flow point is found to strongly increase in muco-obstructive diseases, which may reflect the complete failure of mucociliary clearance causing episodic obstructions. These results suggest that the analysis of quasi-static and dynamic regimes in sputum rheology is in fact useful as these regimes provide complementary markers of chronic bronchial diseases.

We used thermocapillary stresses induced locally by laser on flowing drops to build high throughput drop switchers and sorters for digital microfluidics. Since the laser is disconnected to the chip, the method does not require dedicated micropatterning. We show switching efficiencies of 100% for drop velocities up to 1.3 cm s , demonstrate the involved mechanism and apply laser switching for sorting droplets of different nature for lab-on-a-chip applications.

Particle filtration occurs whenever particles flow through porous media such as membrane. Progressive capture or deposition of particles inside porous structure often leads to complete, and generally unwanted, fouling of the pores. Previously there has been no experimental work that has determined the particle dynamics of such a process at the pore level, since imaging the particles individually within the pores remains a challenge. Here, we overcome this issue by flowing fluorescently dyed particles through a model membrane, a microfluidic filter, imaged by a confocal microscope. This setup allows us to determine the temporal evolution of pore fouling at the particle level, from the first captured particle up to complete blocking of the pore. We show that from the very beginning of pore fouling the immobile particles inside the pore significantly participate in the capture of other flowing particles. For the first time it is determined how particles deposit inside the pore and form aggregates that eventually merge and block the pore.

We experimentally investigate the thermocapillary migration induced by local laser heating of the advancing front of a growing droplet confined in a microfluidic channel. When heating implies an effective increase in interfacial tension, the laser behaves as a "soft door" whose stiffness can be tuned via the optical parameters (beam power and waist). The light-driven thermocapillary velocity of a growing droplet, which opposes the basic flow, is characterized for different types of fluid injection, either pressure or flow rate driven, and various channel aspect ratios. Measurements are interpreted using a simplified model for the temperature gradient at the interface, based on a purely diffusive, three-layer system. Considering the mean temperature gradient, we demonstrate that the classical large-scale temperature gradient behavior is retrieved in the opposite case when the thermal gradient length scale is smaller than the droplet size. We also demonstrate that the thermocapillary velocity is proportional to the smallest droplet curvature imposed by the channel confinement. This suggests that the thermocapillary velocity is in fact proportional to the mean temperature gradient and to the largest interface curvature radius, which both coincide with the imposed one and the spherical droplet radius in large-scale and unconfined situations. Furthermore, as used surfactant concentrations are largely above the critical micelle concentration, we propose a possible explanation, relying on state-of-the-art considerations on high-concentration surfactant-covered interfaces for the observed effective increase in interfacial tension with temperature. We also propose a mechanism for explaining the blocking effect at the scaling-law level. This mechanism involves the temporal evolution of hydrodynamic and thermocapillary forces, based on experimental observations. We finally show that this optocapillary interaction with a microfluidic droplet generator allows for controlling either the flow rate (valve) or the droplet size (sampler), depending on the imposed fluid injection conditions.

The accumulation of colloidal particles to build dense structures from dilute suspensions may follow distinct routes. The mechanical, structural and geometrical properties of these structures depend on local hydrodynamics and colloidal interactions. Using model suspensions flowing into microfabricated porous obstacles, we investigate this interplay by tuning both the flow pattern and the ionic strength. We observe the formation of a large diversity of shapes, and demonstrate that growing structures in turn influence the local velocity pattern, favouring particle deposition either locally or over a wide front. We also show that these structures are labile, stabilised by the flow pushing on them, in low ionic strength conditions, or cohesive, in a gel-like state, at higher ionic strength. The interplay between aggregate cohesion and erosion thus selects preferential growth modes and therefore dictates the final shape of the structure.