The liquid–liquid flow dynamics and droplet formation in a modified step T‐junction microchannel

Abstract The droplet generation mechanism in the asymmetrically enhanced step T‐junction remains unknown, especially for the transition stage from dripping to jetting regimes. In this work, the droplet generation mechanism was systematically investigated in a modified step T‐junction by modulating a large flowrate range and altering different interfacial tensions. We found that under different fluid regimes, both the capillary number and flow rate ratio of continuous and dispersed phase showcase completely different impacts over droplet generation. In dripping regime, the interfacial tension, which was controlled by changing the surfactant concentration, dominated the formation mechanism when the surfactant concentration was found below micelle concentration. In jetting regime, our experimental results showed that the influence of the surfactant concentration on the size of generated droplets was rather negligible while the flow rate ratio of continuous and dispersed phase indeed determined such a parameter. In the dripping‐jetting transition stage, an increase of droplet size was observed despite the increase of continuous phase flow. After reaching a peak, the droplet dimension started to decrease with the increase of continuous phase flow as expected. To the best for our knowledge, it is the first study to report generation mechanism in modified step T‐junction from dripping to jetting regimes.