Confinements regulate capillary instabilities of fluid threads

We study the breakup of confined fluid threads at low flow rates to understand instability mechanisms. To determine the critical conditions between the earlier quasi-stable necking stage and the later unstable collapse stage, simulations and experiments are designed to operate at an extremely low flow rate. Critical mean radii at neck centres are identified by the stop-flow method for elementary microfluidic configurations. Analytical investigations reveal two distinct origins of capillary instabilities. One is the gradient of capillary pressure induced by the confinements of geometry and external flow, whereas the other is the competition between local capillary pressure and internal pressure determined by the confinements.