Mixing enhancement in an acousto-inertial microfluidic system
ZahraGhorbaniKharaji,ValiKalantar,MortezaBayareh
Abstract
The achievement of efficient micromixing inside microfluidic devices is crucial to perform biological assays. Slow mass transfer is a limiting factor in these devices. In this paper, a high-throughput acousto-inertial micromixer is proposed to assess the impact of parameters affecting the passive section of the micromixer, including Reynolds number (Re) and curvature radius (rc), as well as the parameters affecting the active section, such as the applied frequency (f) and displacement amplitude (d0). It is found that the background flow in the active section of the micromixer becomes stronger as Re is increased, which suppresses the acoustic streamings, limiting their effect near the sharp edges. The results demonstrate that the second-order velocity is enhanced with f, improving the acoustic field strength and mixing performance. Furthermore, reducing rc and increasing f and d0 improve the mixing performance of the micromixer. The proposed micromixer can be utilized for fast chemical and biological reactions and assays.