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Viscoelastic flow behavior and formation of dead zone around triangle-shaped pillar array in microchannel

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Abstract

This study reports the influence of the dead zone (DZ) formed around obstacles due to the viscoelastic fluid flow on the flow behavior and properties. It is known that when a viscoelastic fluid, which is a semi-dilute polymer solution, is infused into a channel with structures resembling a pillar, a DZ is formed around the structure owing to the shear-variation-induced viscosity changes. In this study, hydrolyzed polyacrylamide solutions were infused into a microchannel with a triangle-shaped pillar array. Furthermore, the continuous contraction and expansion flow around the pillars were investigated using a micro-particle image velocimetry. The flow measurement results showed that the shape of DZ changes depending on the Weissenberg number, and accordingly, the flow behavior around and inside the DZ changes. In particular, it was confirmed that the velocity fluctuations trend in the entire flow field increased with the growth in DZ. Moreover, it was found that the shear caused by the velocity difference between the DZ and the other region induces a non-uniform viscosity distribution in the DZ, resulting in the formation of a complex flow containing both extension and rotation behavior inside the DZ.

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Data availability

The data underlying the results presented in this paper are not publicly available at this time, but may be obtained from the authors upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

This research was financially supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research(B) No. 19H02084, supported by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Japan. The authors would like to thank S. Teshima for his support in the pre- and post-processing in μPIV. We also wish to express our gratitude to M. Suda for modeling the microchannels.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Tokyo University of Science, 6-3-1, Niijuku, Katsushika, Tokyo, 125-8585, Japan

    Yoshiyasu Ichikawa & Masahiro Motosuke

  2. Research Institute for Science and Technology, Tokyo University of Science, 6-3-1, Niijuku, Katsushika, Tokyo, 125-8585, Japan

    Yoshiyasu Ichikawa & Masahiro Motosuke

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  1. Yoshiyasu Ichikawa
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  2. Masahiro Motosuke
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Correspondence to Yoshiyasu Ichikawa.

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Ichikawa, Y., Motosuke, M. Viscoelastic flow behavior and formation of dead zone around triangle-shaped pillar array in microchannel. Microfluid Nanofluid 26, 44 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10404-022-02549-9

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