Photothermal heating for water vapor microbubble generation and microfluidic control

Abstract

The photothermal conversion property of the gold nanoisland film enables us spatiotemporally flexible and localized fluid heating. Using this method, we generated water-vapor-rich microbubbles in degassed water and controlled the temperature gradient on them. Because of the Marangoni effect and bubble oscillation, the rapid flow was developed around the bubbles, whose flow direction was controllable by the direction of the temperature gradient.