Controlled buckling and crumpling of nanoparticle-coated droplets

We introduce a new experimental approach to study the structural transitions of large numbers of nanoparticle-coated droplets as their volume is reduced. We use an emulsion system where the dispersed phase is slightly soluble in the continuous phase. By adding a fixed amount of unsaturated continuous phase, the volume of the droplets can be controllably reduced, causing them to buckle or crumple, thereby becoming nonspherical. The resultant morphologies depend both on the extent of volume reduction and the average droplet size. The buckling and crumpling behavior implies that the droplet surfaces are solid.