Microfluidic behavior in melt-spun hollow and liquid core fibers

Abstract

The development of thermoplastic fibers containing a liquid core is described. Internal morphology analysis confirms that the liquid-containing core is composed of a continuous cylindrical microchannel of constant diameter. Microfluidic experiments on both liquid core and reference hollow fibers were conducted by pumping distilled water through several filaments simultaneously. The observed fluid motions are satisfactorily described by the Hagen-Poiseuille law, indicating that the hollow and liquid core fibers have internal diameters of 31.6 and 14.8 µm, respectively. Flushing the liquid core fibers with a surfactant solution efficiently removes the saturated ester initially used during the melt spinning of the fiber.