Microfluidics-Engineered Microcapsules: Advances in Thermal Energy Storage and Regulation

Phase-change microcapsules offer significant advantages for thermal energy storage and regulation. However, conventional mechanical agitation fabrication methods encounter difficulties in achieving monodispersity, precise size control, and structural uniformity. Droplet microfluidics emerges as a promising alternative, enabling controllable production of microcapsules with tunable sizes (1-1000 μm), programmable core-shell configurations, and high encapsulation efficiency. This review comprehensively summarizes recent advances in microfluidic strategies for phase-change microcapsules fabricating, including single encapsulation, multi-core encapsulation, and high-throughput parallelization and their applications in solar energy storage, building thermal regulation, electronics cooling, and smart textiles. The review highlights key challenges for future advancement which will unlock the full potential of microfluidics-engineered phase-change microcapsules in next-generation thermal energy technologies.