Enhanced bio-fluids mixing by the soft polyelectrolyte layer-modulated electroosmotic vortices

Abstract

We investigate the mixing of soft biofluids in a narrow fluidic device under the influence of electroosmotic vortices generated by the patterned soft polyelectrolyte layers (PEL)-modulated electrical double effect. We numerically solve the transport equations that describe the solute mixing in the chosen configuration and estimate the shear-induced kinetics of binary aggregation in the deployed soft matter system. The prevailing interplay of forcings that stems from the fluid rheology and geometrical parameters of the PEL substantially affects the size and strength of the developed vortices, which, in turn, non-trivially modulate the underlying mixing strength. We aptly demonstrate in this endeavor that the higher shear-thinning behavior of the constituent components together with the larger extent of PEL's structure results in enhanced solute mixing (>90%). Additionally, we estimate the characteristic time of binary aggregation kinetics, which is particularly pertinent for analyzing the mixing of biofluids containing biomolecules, based on the set of parameters used in this analysis. The results reveal that increasing the shear-thinning behavior of solutes decreases the characteristic time of binary aggregation kinetics. Overall, the findings of this work seem to be of beneficial importance for the design and development of state-of-the-art on-chip devices intended for the augmented mixing of soft biofluids.