“…The advantage of this method is in its simplicity. Compared to other microfluidic fabrication methods used to store drops on chip, such as glass fabrication (Boitard et al, 2012), pumps and valves to compartmentalize cells (Thorsen et al, 2002; Leung et al, 2012), multilayer PDMS devices with water reservoirs (Dewan et al, 2012; Leung et al, 2012), floating or sunken arrays (Shim et al, 2009; Khorshidi et al, 2014; Håti et al, 2016), or fabricating channels on a microfluidic device to trap single cells (Balaban et al, 2004; Rowat et al, 2009; Wang et al, 2010), the DropSOAC approach simply uses a tight-lidded Petri dish to maintain fluid phase equilibrium in the PDMS surrounding the drops. The enclosed, transportable, and compact DropSOAC capsule allows drops to remain stationary and maintain their size over long hours of time-lapse imaging.…”