New method of producing mono-sized polymer gel particles using microchannel emulsification and UV irradiation

It has been established that the combination of microchannel (MC) emulsification and UV-induced gelation is quite effective in producing mono-sized gel particles from acryloyl-type monomer/polymer solutions. MC emulsification allows one to produce the monomer solution droplets with less than ca. 5% relative standard deviation. On the other hand, using UV-induced gelation technique, pre-gel droplets containing a photoinitiator gelate by irradiation of UV light for a few minutes without requiring heating and/or intermediate adding of reaction accelerator. Conveniently, the particle size is adjusted from a few μm to ca. 100-μm by changing the slit size of the MC plate. Furthermore, gel particles may contain a variety of materials, such as metals, pigments, dyes, oils, bubbles, or others, suggesting various potential industrial applications.