Geometric Optimization of Micromixers

M. Jain[1], A. Rao[1], K. Nandakumar[1]
[1]Cain Department of Chemical Engineering, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA, USA
Published in 2012

The performance of a homogeneous T-mixer can be enhanced significantly by the stimulation of secondary/ transverse flows in the microchannel. Various mixing mechanisms are reported for enhancing micromixing performance such as grooves at the channel bottom, heterogeneous charge patterns etc. Most of these micromixers are studied with respect to planar geometric parameters such as groove width, groove spacing, channel height etc. The effect of geometric shape or charge patterns is not systematically studied. In this work, we will summarize various case studies where geometric optimization is found to improve the mixing performance. This numerical optimization study would discuss the following cases: (a) Heterogeneous charge pattern optimization for electrokinetic mixers and (b) Groove shape optimization for pressure driven and electrokinetic micromixers.