Mixing of Liquids in Microfluidic Devices

B. Finlayson, A. Aditya, V. Brasher, L. Dahl, H. Dinh, A. Field, J. Flynn, C. Jenssen, D. Kress, F. Ninh, A. Nordmeier, H. Song, and C. Yuen

University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
Published in 2008

The mixing of liquids was characterized in thirteen different microfluidic devices. The goal was to characterize, in a uniform manner, the flow and mixing that occurred in slow, laminar flow and to present the results that allow quick designs.

The mixing of a dilute chemical in another liquid during slow, laminar flow is a particularly difficult task, but the results showed that for Reynolds number of 1.0 (appropriate to microfluidics) the amount of mixing depended mainly on the flow length divided by the Peclet number, for all geometries. All simulations were done using COMSOL Multiphysics using the Navier-Stokes equation and the convective diffusion equation.

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