05/05/2026
A 100 pL water droplet evaporates in about 1.7 seconds.
At this scale, evaporation starts immediately because the surface is large compared to the volume. Small changes in temperature, humidity or airflow already have a strong effect on how long the droplet remains stable.
This directly influences volume, concentration and also the available time window for optical inspection after dispensing.
Thatโs why in picoliter applications, it is not enough to control the droplet generation. The surrounding conditions like humidity and temperature need to be controlled as well to achieve stable and reproducible results.