Abstract
This letter presents a controlled coalescence of nanoliter liquid droplets in air by acoustic directional ejections. An asymmetrical electric field is created within a piezoelectric transducer to produce lopsided acoustic waves, which are focused (through a lens based on the innate impedance mismatch between solid and gas) onto a spot on the liquid surface. The focused acoustic beam is shown to obliquely eject 80-μm -diameter droplets at a traveling speed of 2.3 ms. Up to four such obliquely ejected droplets coalesce in air into a single droplet, which then continue to travel, rotating at 16 000 rads and producing effective micromixing in air.
Original language | English (US) |
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Article number | 223902 |
Journal | Applied Physics Letters |
Volume | 89 |
Issue number | 22 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 2006 |
Externally published | Yes |
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Physics and Astronomy (miscellaneous)