figure 2.

microfluidic-assisted coalescence of protein droplets (e.g., laf-1) into a single protein stream used for microrheology. (a) protein droplets (green) stick to pdms posts and coalesce into a protein-rich stream. right panel shows time-lapse of coalescence; scale bar = 20 µm. (b) brightfield and fluorescent images of a large protein-rich phase in the box microfluidic device. (inset) zoomed in fluorescent image of red tracer beads embedded in the protein-rich phase. (c) msd versus lag time for laf-1 at high salt (250 mm nacl, dark blue dashed line), whi3 at physiological salt in the presence of 53 nm bni1 mrna (150 mm kcl, pink dash-dotted line), laf-1 at low salt (125 mm nacl, cyan solid line), gar-1δn at low salt (150 mm nacl, blue dotted line), and the noise floor (black dashed line). black solid line has a slope of 1; the noise floor is ~ 2 × 10⁻⁵ µm².