In this Master thesis, an asymmetric hypodermic GDVN (HDN) was designed, experimentally tested and evaluated for the purpose of producing micro-jets and droplets for sample delivery in serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) and single particle imaging (SPI). An experimental set-up was built to evaluate the diameter, length and velocity of the jet and droplets. It was designed to capture and analyse footage using computer vision, measure gas pressure drops and liquid volume flow rates. Nitrogen was used as a flow focusing gas for the water jet. A parametric experimental study was carried out to investigate the influence of liquid flow rate, gas pressure drop and nozzle orifice diameter on the jet diameter, jet length and droplet size. Eighteen measurements were performed in the range of gas We 200-25000, liquid We 3-65, gas Re 2600-18000 and liquid Re 9-65. The diameter of jets ranged 0,46-2,02 μm and the length of jets ranged 9-96 μm. The diameter of droplets ranged 0,75-0,95 μm. HDNs were observed to produce stable jets and droplets of sub-micron diameters at volume flow rates of 0,6-1,0 μl/min. The conclusions were (I) that HDNs are suitable for SFX with respect to the jet diameter and estimated velocity (approximately 100 m/s), but not with respect to the jet length, (II) that HDNs are suitable for SPI as they produce small droplets that cannot be produced by conventional GDVNs.
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