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ARTICLES YOU MAY BE INTERESTED INIn this study, the Lattice Boltzmann Method (LBM) is used to investigate the deformation of two droplets within microfluidic T-junctions (MFTD). In order to increase the accuracy the two immiscible fluids are modeled using the He-Chen-Zhang model. First, this model is applied to ensure that the surface tension effect existing between the droplets and the continuous fluid is properly implemented in the model. Then the collision and merging of the two droplets within the intersection of a T-shaped microchannel is investigated. For generating droplet formation the effects of relevant dimensionless parameters such as the Reynolds, the Weber numbers as well as a collision parameter affecting the two droplets during their motion and deformation are studied. It is found that by increasing the relative velocities of the inlet flows and droplet sizes, the deformation of the two droplets increases significantly. Our results also show that when the surface tension increases, it takes less time for the droplets to collide each other. Therefore, the droplet formation in MFTD depends significantly on the droplet size, inlet velocity as well as surface tension. Finally, we successfully investigated a two-phase flow streaming energy conversion system associated with droplet coalescence. The apprehension of fundamental physics of the droplet formation is useful for many applications including, stem cell phenotypes, cell transplantation and drug delivery in biomedical applications. © 2016 Author(s)

In the current study, droplet generation in a T-junction fluidic channel device was studied through using electrowetting actuation with the consideration of different droplet forming regimes. For this purpose, the finite element method (FEM) was used to solve the unsteady Naiver-Stokes equation. In addition, the level set method was applied to capture the interface between two phases. It was shown that there was a good agreement between obtained data and other work during the process of droplet generation in the absence of electrowetting actuation which results in decrease in the size of droplet with increasing the velocity ratios. In shearing regime, the effectiveness of electrowetting on the droplet generation frequency as well as droplet size is visible in a T-junction fluidic channel since after applying voltages, specified with non-dimensional electrowetting numbers of ?=0.5 and 1.2, dispersed phase is pulled out into the oil phase. In fact, with applying the voltage on the top wall, the droplet breakup time was decreased and smaller droplets were produced. Finally, different important parameters such as pressure difference across the interface as well as Shear Stress exerted from the continuous phase shear stress were examined in a detail.