TY - JOUR
T1 - Elasto-inertial microparticle focusing in straight microchannels
T2 - A numerical parametric investigation
AU - Charjouei Moghadam, Mohammad
AU - Eilaghi, Armin
AU - Rezai, Pouya
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Author(s).
PY - 2021/9/1
Y1 - 2021/9/1
N2 - Elasto-inertial microfluidic particle separation has attracted attention in biotechnological applications due to its passive nature and enhanced versatility compared to inertial systems. Developing a robust elasto-inertial sorting device can be facilitated with numerical simulation. In this study, a numerical parametric investigation was undertaken to study elasto-inertial focusing of microparticles in a straight microchannel. Our goal was to develop an approach that could be both accurate and easily implementable on the commercial solvers. We simulated the flow field using the Carreau model. The resulting elastic lift force was implemented based on an approximation of the Oldroyd-B model. Results were verified and validated against experimental measurements by us and others. A parametric study was conducted to investigate elasto-inertial particle focusing considering the important non-dimensional numbers such as the Reynolds number (Re), the Deborah number (De), dimensionless channel length (L), and blockage ratio . Based on this investigation, the commonly used design threshold, that is,Based on this analysis and the new thresholding scheme, an empirical non-dimensional correlation was developed to predict elasto-inertial particle dispersion in straight square cross-sectional microchannels. Using this new correlation, variation in predicted dispersion was reduced from Our model can be used to optimize the design of elasto-inertial microfluidic particle sorters to improve experimental outcomes.
AB - Elasto-inertial microfluidic particle separation has attracted attention in biotechnological applications due to its passive nature and enhanced versatility compared to inertial systems. Developing a robust elasto-inertial sorting device can be facilitated with numerical simulation. In this study, a numerical parametric investigation was undertaken to study elasto-inertial focusing of microparticles in a straight microchannel. Our goal was to develop an approach that could be both accurate and easily implementable on the commercial solvers. We simulated the flow field using the Carreau model. The resulting elastic lift force was implemented based on an approximation of the Oldroyd-B model. Results were verified and validated against experimental measurements by us and others. A parametric study was conducted to investigate elasto-inertial particle focusing considering the important non-dimensional numbers such as the Reynolds number (Re), the Deborah number (De), dimensionless channel length (L), and blockage ratio . Based on this investigation, the commonly used design threshold, that is,Based on this analysis and the new thresholding scheme, an empirical non-dimensional correlation was developed to predict elasto-inertial particle dispersion in straight square cross-sectional microchannels. Using this new correlation, variation in predicted dispersion was reduced from Our model can be used to optimize the design of elasto-inertial microfluidic particle sorters to improve experimental outcomes.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85114511060&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1063/5.0060709
DO - 10.1063/5.0060709
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85114511060
SN - 1070-6631
VL - 33
JO - Physics of Fluids
JF - Physics of Fluids
IS - 9
M1 - 092002
ER -