Research Description
Colloids are broadly defined as particles that have a linear dimension between 10A and 1 micron. Several different materials including microspheres, aerosols, cells etc. fall into this category. The creation of colloids with precise control over their physical characteristics is a significant and important challenge. We are interested in using microfluidics to accomplish this objective.
Microfluidics is the study of the flow of fluids in very small channels, typically less than 1/10th of a millimetre in channel width. We are looking at the use of microfluidic channels to finely control the creation of novel colloidal materials (Fig. A and B). We are particularly interested in creating novel magnetic colloids and studying the effects of external magnetic fields on their creation. My present work involves experiments with microfluidic channels to create these colloids. The application of magnetic colloids in fundamental biophysical studies is an aspect that is interesting to our group. We will be looking at magnetic colloid probes to generate forces at the micron scale and probe the rheology of the intracellular matrix.
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| A: Magnetic fluid shearing off at a T-junction. |
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B: Magnetic droplets shown down stream. |
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Magnetic Fluids 
