Microdroplet Approach for Measuring Aqueous Solubility and Nucleation Kinetics of a Metastable Polymorph: The Case of KDP Phase IV

Solubility and interfacial energy are two fundamental parameters underlying the competitive nucleation of polymorphs. However, solubility measurement of metastable phases comes with a risk of solvent-mediated transformations, which can render the results unreliable. In this work, we present a rapid microfluidic technique for measuring the aqueous solubility of the metastable form using KDP Phase IV as a model system. This bracketing approach involves analyzing the dissolution behavior of crystals in contact with supersaturated microdroplets generated via evaporation. Then, with the help of our recently developed nucleation time measurement technique, together with Mersmann calculation of interfacial energies from solubilities, we were able to access the interfacial energies of both the metastable and stable phases. To gain further insights into the observed nucleation behavior, we employed Classical Nucleation Theory (CNT) to model the competition of polymorphs using our measured solubility and calculated interfacial energies. The results show that the stable form is favored at lower supersaturation, while the metastable form is favored at higher supersaturation, in good agreement with our observations and experimental reports in the literature. Overall, our microfluidic approach allows access to unprecedentedly deep levels of supersaturation and reveals an interesting interplay between thermodynamics and kinetics in polymorphic nucleation. The experimental methods and insights presented herein can be of great interest, notably in the mineral processing and pharmaceutical industry.