Patterned surface charges coupled with thermal gradients may create giant augmentations of solute dispersion in electro-osmosis of viscoelastic fluids

16Citations
Citations of this article
10Readers
Mendeley users who have this article in their library.

This article is free to access.

Abstract

Augmenting the dispersion of a solute species and fluidic mixing remains a challenging proposition in electrically actuated microfluidic devices, primarily due to an inherent plug-like nature of the velocity profile under uniform surface charge conditions. While a judicious patterning of surface charges may obviate some of the concerning challenges, the consequent improvement in solute dispersion may turn out to be marginal. Here, we show that by exploiting a unique coupling of patterned surface charges with intrinsically induced thermal gradients, it may be possible to realize giant augmentations in solute dispersion in electro-osmotic flows. This is effectively mediated by the phenomena of Joule heating and surface heat dissipation, so as to induce local variations in electrical properties. Combined with the rheological premises of a viscoelastic fluid that are typically reminiscent of common biofluids handled in lab-on-a-chip-based micro-devices, our results demonstrate that the consequent electro-hydrodynamic forcing may open up favourable windows for augmented hydrodynamic dispersion, which has not yet been unveiled.

Cite

CITATION STYLE

APA

Mukherjee, S., Dhar, J., DasGupta, S., & Chakraborty, S. (2019). Patterned surface charges coupled with thermal gradients may create giant augmentations of solute dispersion in electro-osmosis of viscoelastic fluids. Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 475(2221). https://doi.org/10.1098/rspa.2018.0522

Register to see more suggestions

Mendeley helps you to discover research relevant for your work.

Already have an account?

Save time finding and organizing research with Mendeley

Sign up for free