Numerical Analysis of Mixing in a Serpentine Microchannel

초록

Numerical analysis has been performed on three-dimensional serpentine microchannel with “L-shaped”repeating units to investigate mixing and fluid flow using Navier-Stokes equations. A parameter, mixing index based on the variance of mass fraction on a plane across the flow along channel length has been evaluated to analyze mixing in channel. The effect of design parameters on mixing and pressure drop has been analyzed. Mixing performance is significantly effected by geometric parameters. The presence of high circulation near the inlet and outlet of channel-d is likely to contribute in mixing. At low value of Reynolds number 1 and 10, pressure drop is not affected by d/w, however, at higher value i.e. 35 and 70, pressure drop increases with decrease in d/w.