Insights into a T-type micromixer with novel electromagnetic mixing

Abstract

A novel T-type electromagnetic micromixer is proposed by combining the effects of laminar flow with Lorentz force in the microchannel. Through finite element simulation, the effects of inlet velocity, applied voltage, magnetic flux density, magnet diameter and the distance between magnet and microchannel on the fluid mixing in the micromixer were numerically investigated. When increasing the external voltage, magnetic flux density, magnet diameter and reducing the distance between the magnet and the microchannel, the mixing efficiency of the micromixer are significantly increased, showing potentials for various mixing conditions by simply modifying the configuration of the microchannel and adjusting the applied electromagnetic field. To better understand the flow state, the fluid surface sections are illustrated at five positions through the whole channel from the inlets to outlets. By adjusting the above-mentioned effects, the mixing efficiency achieves as high as approximately 97%, demonstrating the excellent mixing in the novel electromagnetic micromixer. This newly proposed micromixer shows advantages of rapid mixing, simple microchannel with patterned shapes, easy to manufacture, and repeatable to use, providing a potential method for active fluid mixing in a rapid and flexible way on microfluidic chip and a development direction for the fluid mixing in microscale.