Temperature-triggered microfluidic fabrication of monodisperse organic particles via LCST-mediated phase transition

Abstract

We report a microfluidic strategy for fabricating monodisperse organic particles by exploiting temperature-controlled miscibility in mixed solvents exhibiting lower critical solution temperature (LCST) behavior. In a water–diethylene glycol monohexyl ether (C6E2) system, phase separation at elevated temperatures enables controlled generation of monodisperse droplets, which subsequently reprecipitate into particles upon cooling to the miscible state. As a result, poly(vinyl alcohol) microparticles with a coefficient of variation below 9% were successfully obtained. This LCST-driven microfluidic approach offers a general platform for producing highly uniform particles from both polymeric and low-molecular-weight organic compounds.