Researchers invent a better way to coat liquid drops

Technology invented by researchers at Waterloo Engineering could improve the targeted delivery of drugs within the human body.

The researchers developed a faster, cheaper way of coating and protecting liquid drops as they fall through a thin layer of liquid shell, a process that uses gravity and other natural forces.

Sirshendu Misra, a PhD student at Waterloo Engineering, works on encapsulation research in the Micro Nano-Scale Transport Lab.

The shell, once hardened by exposure to ultraviolet light, is designed to dissolve and release its contents when required - after reaching a particular area of the body, for instance.

“It is a very simple technique that requires almost no energy – and it is extremely rapid,” said Sushanta Mitra, an engineering professor and executive director of the Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology. “Encapsulation takes place in milliseconds.”